6 Practices to Make Your Code More Meaningful (and Less Buggy)

A Guide to Better Code

Photo by Chris Ried on Unsplash

I came across these techniques some time ago, found them really interesting, and wanted to share them with my followers.

Writing code that’s easy to read, maintain, and extend isn’t just about syntax or style guides — it’s about how you convey your intent and handle mistakes. Here are six practices you can start using right away to make your code more robust and easier to understand.

1. Avoid Using Primitives for Everything

Using basic data types like String and boolean for every concept often makes your code less readable and more brittle. For instance, if you have a function like:

public void updateUser(String userId, String status) {
    // ...
}

It’s not immediately clear what status should look like (any string?), and you may accidentally pass the wrong value.

Better Approach:

In nominally typed languages (like Java), use:

• Enums for restricted sets of values.
• Value classes/record classes (in Java 16+, you can use records) to wrap domain concepts.