Chapter 8. Refactoring, Debugging, and Testing

There is more to software development than simply writing code. Among other things, we may need to modify or reuse existing code to correct bugs and enhance the product. As we create code, we will need to uncover errors using various debugging approaches. We will need to test our application at various points in the development process to ensure it meets its business and technical requirements. There are other activities required when developing software, but these are the ones of interest to us in this chapter. Here, we will focus on three major activities: refactoring code, debugging, and testing.

Whether we are writing new code or modifying old code, refactoring is a powerful tool in your programming arsenal. With the support of IDEs, you can quickly and safely transform code to address a particular design concern. There are a number of refactoring operations supported by IDEs, including simple support for consistent and comprehensive renaming...