Skip to Content
Clean Code: A Handbook of Agile Software Craftsmanship, 2nd Edition
book

Clean Code: A Handbook of Agile Software Craftsmanship, 2nd Edition

by Robert C. Martin
October 2025
Intermediate to advanced
673 pages
15h 55m
English
Addison-Wesley Professional
Content preview from Clean Code: A Handbook of Agile Software Craftsmanship, 2nd Edition

10

One Thing

Images

Do you remember what Bjarne Stroustrup said about clean code? He said, “Clean code does one thing well.” And, indeed, many other software authors have said things like that over the years. The problem with that statement is: What does one thing mean?

As I said in a previous chapter, I was once responsible for a C function that was 3,000 lines long. It was named gi, which stood for graphic interpreter. Had anyone challenged me about whether my 3,000-line function did one thing, I would have confidently replied: “Certainly! It interprets graphics.”

Of course, a 3,000-line function must be doing a lot of things while it interprets ...

Become an O’Reilly member and get unlimited access to this title plus top books and audiobooks from O’Reilly and nearly 200 top publishers, thousands of courses curated by job role, 150+ live events each month,
and much more.

Read now

Unlock full access

More than 5,000 organizations count on O’Reilly

AirBnbBlueOriginElectronic ArtsHomeDepotNasdaqRakutenTata Consultancy Services

QuotationMarkO’Reilly covers everything we've got, with content to help us build a world-class technology community, upgrade the capabilities and competencies of our teams, and improve overall team performance as well as their engagement.
Julian F.
Head of Cybersecurity
QuotationMarkI wanted to learn C and C++, but it didn't click for me until I picked up an O'Reilly book. When I went on the O’Reilly platform, I was astonished to find all the books there, plus live events and sandboxes so you could play around with the technology.
Addison B.
Field Engineer
QuotationMarkI’ve been on the O’Reilly platform for more than eight years. I use a couple of learning platforms, but I'm on O'Reilly more than anybody else. When you're there, you start learning. I'm never disappointed.
Amir M.
Data Platform Tech Lead
QuotationMarkI'm always learning. So when I got on to O'Reilly, I was like a kid in a candy store. There are playlists. There are answers. There's on-demand training. It's worth its weight in gold, in terms of what it allows me to do.
Mark W.
Embedded Software Engineer

You might also like

Clean Code: A Handbook of Agile Software Craftsmanship

Clean Code: A Handbook of Agile Software Craftsmanship

Robert C. Martin

Publisher Resources

ISBN: 9780135398586