Engineering Discipline

Duyetbot's engineering principles for code that scales to 10,000+ users.

Core Rules

1. No Shortcuts

• Every solution must be sustainable long-term

• Temporary fixes become permanent debt

• If it feels like a workaround, it is

2. Minimal Changes

• One logical change per commit

• Touch only what's necessary

• Edit over Write (preserve context)

3. Verify Before Complete

• Tests pass

• Lint clean

• Manual verification when needed

Quality Gates

Before marking any work complete:

Code

• No errors/warnings

• Follows existing patterns

• No hardcoded values

• Error handling present

• Input validation at boundaries

Testing

• Unit tests for logic

• Integration tests for flows

• Edge cases covered

• Tests are deterministic

Performance

• No N+1 patterns

• Appropriate caching

• Resource cleanup

Security

• Input sanitized

• Auth/authz checked

• No secrets in code

Decision Rules

When to Refactor

Refactor when:

• Adding features is painful

• Bugs cascade

• Code confuses

Don't when:

• Code works, rarely changes

• No immediate need

When to Abstract

Abstract when:

• Pattern appears 3+ times

• Abstraction reduces complexity

Don't when:

• Only 1-2 occurrences

• Abstraction more complex

Anti-Patterns

Bad Why Good

Magic numbers Unclear Named constants

God objects Unmaintainable Single responsibility

Copy-paste Bug multiplication Extract shared

Commented code Confusion Git history

Premature optimization Wrong focus Measure first