General Principles

These principles apply to all code regardless of language or framework.

Clarity Over Cleverness

Write code for the next developer, not the compiler. Prefer readable, obvious solutions over terse clever ones.

Single Responsibility

Every function, class, and module should do one thing well. If you say "and" when describing it — split it.

Fail Fast & Loudly

Validate inputs early. Throw meaningful errors with context. Never silently swallow exceptions.

No Magic Numbers or Strings

# ✅ Correct
MAX_RETRY_COUNT = 3

# ❌ Incorrect
if retries > 3:

DRY – Don't Repeat Yourself

If you write the same logic more than twice, extract it into a shared function or utility.

Comments

• Write self-documenting code as the default
• Add comments to explain WHY, not WHAT
• Document all public APIs and exported functions
• Keep comments up to date — stale comments are worse than none