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name: software-engineering description: Core engineering principles for quality, maintainable code.

Software Engineering Standards

Apply these principles to all code.

Core Principles

• Type-safety (aim for e2e type-safety)
• Monitoring/observability/profiling/tracing
• Simplicity (KISS, YAGNI, no clutter)
• Functional programming (immutability, high order functions)
• Automation (CI pipelines for builds and tests)

Naming & Clarity

• Be concrete: retryAfterMs > timeout, emailValidator > validator
• Avoid vague terms: data, item, list, component, info
• Every character must earn its place
• Use nested objects for context: config.public.ENV_NAME instead of ENV_NAME

Code Organization

• Keep code close to where it's used (unless used 2-3+ times)
• A folder with a single file should be a single file
• Comments are unnecessary 98% of the time (convert to functions/variables)
• Code is reference, history, and functionality - must be readable as a journal

Error Handling

• Always provide user feedback
• Log errors with observability tools
• Use HighOrderFunctions for monitoring/error handling/profiling

Testing

• Test behavior, not implementation
• Write test for each bug fixed (prevents re-occurrence)
• 3rd person verbs (not "should")
• Organize with describe blocks

Security & Accessibility

• Follow OWASP best practices
• Strive for WCAG 2.0 guidelines
• Don't write pure SQL strings; use query-builders for injection protection

Avoid

• Premature optimization
• Useless abstractions (functions that mainly call one function, helpers used only once)
• Over-engineering