Code review is a part of the software development process which involves testing the source code to identify bugs at an early stage. A code review process is typically conducted before merging with the codebase.
In this blog, we’ll explain what code review is and explore popular code review tools that help organizations with the code review process.
What Is the Code Review Process?
The primary goal of the code review process is to assess any new code for bugs, errors, and quality standards set by the organization. An intangible benefit of the code review process is the collective team’s improved coding skills.
If you would like to initiate a code review process in your organization, you should first decide who would review the code. If you belong to a small team, you may assign team leads to review all code. In a larger team size with multiple reviewers, you could enable a process in which every code review is assigned to an experienced developer based on their workload.
The next consideration for you is to decide on timelines, rounds, and minimal requirements for submitting code review requests.
The final consideration is about how feedback should be given in the code review process. Make sure you highlight the positive aspects of the code while suggesting alternatives for drawbacks.
Your feedback should be constructive enough to encourage the developer to understand your perspective and initiate a conversation when necessary.
Why Is Code Review Critical?
Code review is critical for the following reasons:
· Ensure that you have no bugs in code.
· Minimize your chances of having issues.
· Confirm new code adheres to guidelines.
· Increase the efficiency of new code.
How to Perform a Code Review?
There are four ways to conduct code reviews.
1. Over-the-Shoulder Code Reviews
Over-the-shoulder code reviews are done on the developer’s workstation, where an experienced team member walks through the new code, providing suggestions through a conversation. It is the easiest approach to code reviews and does not require a pre-defined structure.
Over-the-shoulder code reviews were traditionally done in person, while distributed teams can follow this method through collaborative tools as well.
2. Email Pass-Around
In this code review process, a developer emails a diff of changes to the whole development team, usually through version control systems that automate notifications. This email initiates a conversation on the changes, where team members may request further changes, point out errors, or ask for clarifications.
3. Pair programming
Pair programming is a continuous code review process. Two developers sit at a workstation, but only one of them actively codes whereas the other provides real-time feedback.
While it may serve as a great tool to inspect new code and train developers, it could potentially prove to be inefficient due to its time-consuming nature. This process locks down the reviewer from doing any other productive work during the period.
4. Tool-Assisted
A tool-assisted code review process involves the use of a specialized tool to facilitate the process of code review. A tool generally helps you with the following tasks:
· Organize and display the updated files in a change.
· Facilitate a conversation between reviewers and developers.
· Assess the efficacy of the code review process with metrics.
A Closer Look at 12 Powerful Code Review Tools
There are the most popular static code review tools.
The code review process plays a key role when it comes to boosting the efficiency of your organization. Specifically, taking advantage of the right code review tool is what helps you to remove redundancy in your development cycle.
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How CIOs can achieve work-life balance and avoid burnout
CIOs are struggling for work-life balance now more than ever, but it’s harder than it sounds.
Work-life balance, the loose principle through which you evenly split your time and focus between work and personal activities, benefits individuals and corporations in equal measure.
A healthy work-life balance can improve health, productivity, job retention and turnover, and in-turn stave off emotional burnout, say experienced CIOs. And yet, attaining a healthy equilibrium between personal life and career work has seemed further out of reach than ever.
The economic and social fallout from the COVID-19 pandemic has afforded CIOs more opportunity and accountability in the boardroom, and put additional pressure on project delivery teams to expedite multiyear digital transformation programs. Business expectations for IT teams have subsequently blossomed, but this in itself represents something of a double-edged sword.
Working in isolation while leading teams
Other CIOs expressed difficulties in working in isolation, pointing to the lack of human contact, the transactional nature of videoconferencing and yet the same pressure to lead, motivate and support teams as well as an ecosystem of partners. For some, fighting the itch to do more has been difficult, even during downtime.
To achieve work-life balance, set priorities
Work-life balance can be achieved through delegation and prioritization, as well as setting clear boundaries and taking breaks, CIOs say. But it is also about having a clear idea of what you want to achieve.
The balance has been about setting an end time in the evening, blocking out time in the day to get away from the desk and making time for informal conversations with team members.
How to create work-life balance for your team
These conversations can be part of something bigger. Building trust, transparency and empowerment within teams can help all parties. Somebody goes one step further by suggesting that rewards for a job well done can bring about a healthy work-life balance for all staff.
NextHealth’s James, who recently became the first male employee at the company to take paid parental leave, says this goes back to the “softer” skills required by CIOs today, such as empathy and flexibility, which can in turn lead to improved talent retention.
“People are more than just their jobs and the pandemic is forcing many companies to come to grips with that,” James says. “Many workers are pushing for roles that allow them to have greater flexibility in their careers and the companies that embrace that will retain and attract the greatest talent.”
The work-life balance is ultimately about being smart. “A more balanced life is not just helpful — it’s essential to reaching your full potential. Not only is being happier just as important as being successful, being happier and more balanced actually leads to greater levels of success.”
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The Best Soft Skills You Should Have as a Developer
Introduction
Usually at a job interview for the position of developer in IT companies HR asks you to present your soft and hard skills. It is clear that hard tech skills are more necessary and have priority because without them the job of a developer cannot be done. However, if you want to work as a developer in the IT sector, the job involves more than just hard tech skills.
What are soft skills and why are they so important?
Soft skills are non-technical skills that help you do your job better. Soft skills are important because they make you a better employee, even if you are a great programmer and have the right hard skills you may not be employed if you do not have the right soft skills.
Imagine a great developer who is too closed and has communication difficulties, it just won’t work. As much as programming was an isolated profession and seemed remote from people, on the other hand, it must be as close to people as possible, because when creating complex applications, communication is crucial, especially communication with the client.
Soft skills are also important because they help developers improve and develop their hard skills. Senior developers will transfer their knowledge to a middle or junior developer only on the condition that they have soft skills. Soft skills affect how well you will fit in with others and since the job is most often done in teams that are constantly changing, having such skills is very important.
Just imagine being a freelancer and doing development, soft skills can help you retain clients. If you have good communication skills you have a better chance of gaining new clients and retaining old ones.
These are some of the most important soft skills when it comes to development:
Communication is important and is one of the most underrated soft skills for developers, especially if we are talking about written communication. Communication is of great importance because usually the work is done in a team or teams that are on the same project and there must be quality communication and cooperation between different teams or colleagues who are in different positions. Developers usually have a lot of meetings that are also important, especially if the meetings are directly with clients. Written communication is perhaps even more important since, in addition to programming, developers receive and send emails, write documentation for applications and submit various types of reports.
Teaching is a skill that needs to be learned, it is one thing to tell something and another to transfer knowledge or a complicated area of consciousness to an understandable level. Whether you are a beginner or a developer with years of experience there is certainly something that could be useful to share or something that you know and others do not. Teaching can take many forms, imagine a situation where a developer needs to explain why something the client has imagined cannot be done the way the client asks, you understand the point. Usually, senior developers are in charge of training junior developers through mentoring.
In a world where we have Twitter, Facebook, Instagram, TikTok, or Reddit, it is difficult to stay focused because these social networks are created to constantly distract. The job of a developer is demanding and can be very exhausting. Developers need some time to start working effectively, we can compare that to warming up before some physical training. Once they start working they are faced with the challenge of maintaining that time of effective work, any minor interruption affects focus and productivity unless it is some planned break with a specific goal. If the developer is tired, under pressure, something else distracts him and because of that he loses focus, he will hardly be productive that day and will most likely not meet even the minimum requirements.
The job of a developer involves many more factors than just programming. If it is an application that represents a project or product for the client, the developer should approach in such a way in terms of helping develop and suggest some ideas if he estimates that they would be useful or that the project is going in the wrong direction.
It is also important that the developer takes care of writing the code so that the next developer can continue the same project if necessary. Usually, developers first write code according to their capabilities but when they gather a lot of experience they want to rewrite the code they used to write before.
It is of great importance that the company recognizes the advantages and disadvantages of its developers. One group of developers may be better at communicating, while another group of developers may be better at some other things. Developers who see the bigger picture and where the company discovers their advantages can contribute a lot to the company. Developers who have a broader picture and who discover the benefits can contribute a lot to the company.
With more experienced developers, at some point, most come to the same level of programming knowledge and the only thing that remains is the ability to communicate and collaborate on projects. Developers who have problems with the approach, with communication, with teamwork, simply spoil and slow down, both the team and the project. For this reason, social skills such as healthy communication, cooperation, and teamwork are really important. It is these soft skills with developers that are key to achieving a good atmosphere within teams.
Programming is not just writing code where we adhere to certain rules, programming is also a way of solving problems that requires a special way of thinking. Before solving the problem, it is necessary to first identify what the problem is. If it is a big problem, it is usually divided into several smaller problems that are solved separately to solve that big problem. To solve a problem, it is necessary to know how to approach that problem, and then devise a strategy on how to reach a solution.
In programming, code can rarely work from the first, so a lot of time is spent on debugging. It is often necessary to learn something new along the way and apply it in the current project. All this creates additional effort and stress for the developer, especially if the deadline is approaching. Patience and persistence are great soft skills that make a developer’s job easier.
Also, an important soft skill is passion. If a developer has a passion for a certain area and gets a project from that area, he will certainly try and do better in relation to another developer who is not interested in that area at all. On the other hand, passion also pushes the developer to learn more and work on things he likes if he already has to work on projects that are not interesting to him.
Conclusion
After the above items, we can agree that soft skills are very important for a developer. Developers who work on soft skills while learning to program will have an advantage over others when it comes to a job interview or a real job.
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If you are looking for the best online code editors, we have compiled a list of the best online code editors for web developers.
What is an online code editor?
An online code editor is a tool that resides on a remote server and allows developers to access the tool through a browser to create applications. We can divide them into two types, the simpler ones that have basic features and are more similar to plain text editors, and the more complicated ones that are more similar to complete IDEs. In this article, we will go through both types.
What are the benefits of using an online code editor?
No setup required
No download required
You get an IDE installed and configured
Easily share and collaborate using URLs only
In most cases free or very cheap
What to keep in mind when choosing an online code editor?
How fast the application works
Which programming languages it supports
Is it free or what does it offer as free
Ease of setup
Integrations with repository managers
Does it have NPM support
Custom text and layout settings
Terminal support
Let’s look at a list of the best online code editors that help with web development.
CodePen
CodePen is the most popular code editor and focuses on writing and sharing HTML, CSS, and JavaScript code online. It is very fast and easy to use, which probably makes it the most popular code editor.
It is commonly used to create and test web applications in front-end development. The interface is separate for HTML, CSS, and JavaScript, thus helping the developer to focus on each of them at a time. All changes to the code can be seen live as you type.
CodePen is completely free and it is not necessary to create an account to use it. This way you can very quickly and efficiently start writing code and creating new web applications directly from your web browser.
CodePen allows you to create and share projects (pens) easily via a URL. It is possible to create a collection of pens, view the latest ones, and follow other developers. CodePen allows the use of preprocessors such as SASS and LESS for CSS or Babel for JavaScript, it is also possible to import various JavaScript libraries such as jQuery.
StackBlitz is very similar to Visual Studio Code which is great if you have used VS Code before. This online editor is useful when you need a boilerplate or starter project using your favorite web development library or framework.
StackBlitz supports much more than HTML, CSS and JavaScript. It is possible to create projects using React, Angular, Vue, Svelte, and many others. It also provides support for TypeScript, vanilla JavaScript, or just HTML5. It is also possible to create full-stack projects.
The editor is integrated with GitHub so it can connect to any public GitHub repository. It also has support for NPM dependency management. All StackBlitz applications are automatically deployed on their servers and hosted for free.
CodeSandbox provides an online code editor and sandboxed environment for front-end development. The complete development environment offers various features and code templates which makes code writing faster and easier.
CodeSandbox can serve as a prototyping tool. Like StackBlitz, it allows you to create projects using web development libraries and frameworks. It is also possible to connect to GitHub projects and edit them using CodeSandbox. In addition, it supports NPM library management and linking various libraries using CDN.
CodeSandbox allows you to deploy the production version of the app directly from the editor to some of the more well-known providers such as Netlify, Vercel, and GitHub Pages which is fantastic. In addition, it is possible to create a team environment where multiple developers can collaborate in real-time and edit the same code.
JSFiddle is another popular online editor that helps with web development. It cannot replace full-fledged text editors but handles frontend scripts well. It is possible to create projects using pure JavaScript, HTML5, or a framework such as React, Angular, Vue, or some other. You can use libraries using the CDN and customize the editor layout. JSFiddle also allows multiple developers to collaborate and work on the same code.
One of the oldest online code editors for web development is JS Bin. It is usually used to create prototypes using HTML, JavaScript, and CSS. Of course, external libraries for jQuery, React, Angular, Vue, or some others can also be used. JS Bin has a quick and easy interface, each code snippet can be tested in a browser and then exported to a text file. Since popular HTML, CSS, and JavaScript frameworks can be imported, modern pages and web applications can be easily created which makes JS Bin no worse than other online code editors.
Gitpod is a cloud code editor or IDE (Integrated Development Environment), a collaborative environment that allows you to connect to the git repository and edit the code. It offers integrations with GitHub, GitLab, and Bitbucket. If you’ve used Visual Studio Code and you like it, then Gitpod is a good choice as it offers all the major back-end and front-end languages and frameworks.
Gitpod is a development environment as code, which allows automation, version-control, and sharing developer environments (workspaces) across your team. Once you create a workspace, you will be able to edit and run the code using your preferred online editors. You can choose between Visual Studio Code and Theia Editor.
GitHub CodeSpaces is a cloud-based online hosting environment designed to use Visual Studio Code for development. It is a tool that allows you to open codespace via Visual Studio Code online directly from the GitHub repository and make changes.
PlayCode is an online editor that is primarily designed for JavaScript-based projects. It is commonly used for prototyping in web development. It is possible to create a complete web development project using HTML, CSS, or one of the libraries and frameworks.
Cloud9 is one of the first browser-based IDEs to offer serious features. Today, Cloud9 is part of Amazon’s AWS offerings, however, it can be used for free if the Amazon EC2 instance is originally used.
Cloud9 supports JavaScript, Python, PHP, and a couple of other programming languages. Provides code collaboration and code environment sharing through a few clicks. AWS Cloud9 makes it easy to write and debug serverless applications.
If you have been studying web development for some time, you must have met the W3Schools site and their Tryit code editor at some point. Their code editor can also be used and is very simple. Supports Java, Python, JavaScript and many others.
Replit is free and represents a collaborative IDE within the browser. Supports over 50 programming languages. It is a quality tool for quickly starting, sharing, and developing projects in any programming language, all directly from the browser. No deployment of projects is required as the projects will be hosted immediately.
Glitch is an incredibly good and simple online editor. There is no need to make a configuration or deployment, from the moment you create a new project your Glitch application is live, after which you can share or embed it anywhere. The point is that developers focus on creating the application and therefore Glitch handles all the setup.
So, this was a list of the best online code editors for web development in 2021. You can choose the one that best suits your needs.
This is not a complete list, of course, there are other online code editors you can use, these are the ones we have singled out as the best, most popular, and the ones we recommend.
We hope you found this list useful.
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Since the needs of every web developer are different, developers are welcome to customize their browsers to suit their needs. We can say that part of this customization is extensions or plugins that can help a lot in the developer’s workflow.
In 2021, around 65.27% of the world’s people are using Google Chrome, according to data from June this year. Since the Google Chrome browser is the most widely used in the world and web developers use Google Chrome or Mozilla Firefox the most, we decided to show you a list of the best Google Chrome extensions that can be useful for web developers.
ColorZilla
ColorZilla is an extension that allows the user to find any hue that is in the browser. The selected color can be edited and this extension also offers a CSS gradient editor. Most of these options are already built into Chrome DevTools, so this extension may not be of much concern to some developers.
Lighthouse is an open-source extension and serves as an automated tool to improve the performance, quality, and accuracy of your web applications. It can be used for any website, public or one that requires authentication. Lighthouse specifically audits performance, accessibility, progressive web apps, SEO, and more.
The tool performs a series of tests on the page and generates a report on how successful the page is. Based on this report, the user can conclude what he can do to improve his web application.
Lighthouse can be installed and run as a Google Chrome extension, but it also comes as a built-in tool within Chrome DevTools. It is recommended that you use Chrome DevTools workflow rather than Chrome Extension workflow. The DevTools workflow allows testing of local sites and authenticated pages, while the extension does not.
Developers use a variety of technologies and usually look for inspiration by looking at other sites and applications which is why an extension like Wappalyzer comes across as very useful. The extension analyzes the site and shows what technologies it was created with.
With the help of this extension, you can find out which CMS, framework, eCommerce platform, JavaScript libraries, programming languages, analytics, marketing tools, payment processors, CRM, CDN are used by the site, and much more. A good alternative to this extension is: WhatRuns
Fake Filler is a simple extension that serves to fill in all input fields on a page with randomly generated fake data, usually for filling out forms. This extension is useful because it saves time for developers and testers, without it everything would have to be done manually every time, which would take a lot of time.
CSSViewer is a simple extension that allows you to display CSS properties in an ordered order. The extension was originally made as an add-on for Firefox, after which a version for Chrome was released. Of course, developers can always use Chrome DevTools to view the CSS properties of an element, but this extension allows faster and more transparent access.
JSON Viewer is an extension that enables the printing of JSON and JSONP and offers the possibility of customization so that the code looks beautiful and pleasing to the eye.
If you are a front-end developer and use React at some point you will surely start using the React Developer Tools extension if you have not already, this extension is required. The extension adds React debugging tools to Chrome Developer Tools. Allows you to inspect React component hierarchies using Chrome Developer Tools.
As the name of the extension itself says, WhatFont is used to identify fonts on web pages. The extension is easy to use, just drag the mouse over the letter and the extension will display the font name, for more detailed options you need to use the left mouse click. A good alternative to this extension is: Fonts Ninja
Redux DevTools is an extension that serves for debugging the application’s state changes. The extension provides power-ups for your Redux development workflow. The extension is not limited to Redux, it can be used with any other state-managed architecture.
An extension that can be useful in certain situations. Allows you to open GitHub and GitLab links in Visual Studio Code. Just right-click on any link from the file and the “Open in VSCode” option opens the selected file. If you think that this extension is not so useful, the next hack may be more useful.
For example, if we have the following repository: https://github.com/testuser/testrepo it is enough to add only “1s” in the following way: https://github1s.com/testuser/testrepo and the complete online repository opens. It should be borne in mind that this is not an official project supported by GitHub but an open-source project that can be used as needed.
The Web Developer is one of those extensions that was primarily developed for the Firefox browser since Firefox is also a great browser for developing. The extension adds a toolbar button to Chrome that provides various web developer tools. The Web Developer extension can also be used by people involved in digital marketing.
For some it will be a useful extension, for others, it may not. Picture-in-Picture is a Chrome extension that allows you to watch videos in a floating window on top of other windows. It’s great for following tech talk or maybe tutorials while using other sites. This extension was developed by Google.
As a developer, it is important to test your application and apply responsive design. Windows Resizer allows you to mimic different screen resolutions so you can test the design layout. It is possible to set specific test resolutions that can later be exported and imported to another computer.
The Animo extension is like CSSViewer but more advanced. Allows you to write custom CSS code for any website and displays changes in real-time. It is possible to customize colors, fonts, and layout. Custom CSS code can be saved and used on other devices using Chrome. Animo is considered the best Chrome extension for custom CSS. As with the CSSViewer extension, some options already exist built into Chrome DevTools, so someone won’t even need this extension.
You’ve probably heard of Lorem Ipsum by now. This extension represents the Lorem Ipsum Generator which provides lorem ipsum text that can be copied and used on the website most commonly as a text placeholder. With this extension, paragraphs of different lengths, titles, dates, email addresses, and links can be added.
In each browser, there is an option to clear the cache, which can be configured. The Clear Cache extension allows you to set all the options once, after which just a mouse click is enough to perform the complete cleaning process in a few seconds.
The PerfectPixel extension allows you to use a semi-transparent image over the website so you can perform a pixel-by-pixel comparison between the website and the image. This is a very useful extension for developers because it allows you to create a website exactly as it was designed.
Image Downloader is a great and useful Chrome extension that allows you to download all the images from a specific website. Images can also be downloaded from websites where images are hidden for download. With this extension, it is possible to extract the image link as well as download the image directly. A good alternative to this extension is: Image Downloader
The GoFullPage extension captures a screenshot of the current page without some additional permissions. This extension is very useful for web developers because with one click it provides a full overview of a webpage that can be shared later.
The Page Ruler Redux is a very useful extension that provides a ruler for measuring pixel dimensions and positioning. It is possible to measure the width, height, and position of any element on any website.
One of the key steps in the software development process is to test the application. The LamdbaTest extension provides a cloud-based platform for performing cross-browser testing on 2000+ real browsers and different browser versions for different devices. Such tests help make a website or web application cross-browser compatible, and therefore more robust.
For desktop devices, it is possible to test on Windows and macOS, and for mobile devices, it is possible to test on Android and iOS. It is possible to perform a screenshot testing over 25 devices in a single go. LambdaTest is one of the better extensions for developers, designers, and of course testers.
Ghostery is a privacy extension that aims to prevent all intrusive ads that are usually on websites which is why it has a built-in adblocker. It also has built-in tracking protection to protect your data and block 3rd websites from being tracked, a page speed booster, and an optimizer to make the browsing experience more enjoyable. Ghostery has a dashboard with which the user can adjust their settings.
Since Google Chrome is known to require a lot of RAM during operation, an extension such as Session Buddy comes in handy. This is an extension for developers and designers and provides help with managing browser tabs. It enables bookmark manager, saves sessions, and returns them later as needed thus relieving the browser and freeing up a lot of memory. Session Buddy allows you to manage all tabs from a single page, organize them by topic, and offer a quick tab search. If a system crash occurs Session Buddy will restore all your tabs as you left them.
Extensions are great and you should use them and explore new ones as they appear. However, it is recommended that you use fewer extensions as more extensions can be distracting. Also, you shouldn’t trust extensions completely as they may not be available tomorrow.
It’s best to choose between 5 and 10 extensions that will work for you, and add a new one or remove an old one from time to time. Play around with the extensions and see which ones work best for you.
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