Master Core Programming Principles: KISS, DRY, YAGNI and More

Good programming principles dramatically improve a developer’s ability to write maintainable, low‑defect code. The following principles are compiled from a StackOverflow discussion about the first rules programmers consider.

KISS (Keep It Simple Stupid)

KISS emphasizes simplicity in design; systems should avoid unnecessary complexity, aiming for the simplest solution that works. Originated by Kelly Johnson at Lockheed, the term stresses that designs must be easy to understand and repair.

DRY (Don’t Repeat Yourself)

DRY advocates eliminating duplication in code, documentation, data, and effort. Each piece of knowledge should have a single, authoritative representation, reducing maintenance overhead and preventing inconsistencies.

YAGNI (You Ain’t Gonna Need It)

YAGNI advises implementing features only when they are truly needed, avoiding premature work and saving time, resources, and future refactoring effort.

Code For The Maintainer

Write code that is self‑explanatory and easy for future maintainers to understand and modify.

Be as lazy as possible

Embrace laziness to create reusable solutions, avoid reinventing the wheel, and prevent over‑optimization.

Additional Guidelines

Minimize coupling.

Maximize cohesion.

Open/Closed principle.

Single Responsibility principle.

Hide implementation details.

Law of Demeter.

Reference links: What do you consider the 1st principle(s) of programming? http://programmers.stackexchange.com/questions/91527/what-do-you-consider-the-1st-principles-of-programming Programming Principles https://github.com/webpro/programming-principles