To me, refactoring is one of the most important parts of the software development lifecycle. Most developers are familiar with the idea of refactoring, but customers and managers may not be. So, what is refactoring and what value does it bring to the development process? Refactoring is the process of going through code and redesigning, updating, and fixing with the intent of improving the code. This can encompass a lot of different improvements. For example, a developer may find that certain blocks of code are repeated over and over again. Repeated code can cause all kinds of problems. At the very least it increases the size of the application needlessly, but on the more problematic size, it also decreases maintainability of the application. For example, if a code block is repeated 8 times, and the required logic for that code must change, the code will need to be replaced in 8 different places. Chances are good that developers will only find 7 and you’ll spend months trying to figure out where the problem is. Other common tasks involve redesigning to make the application cleaner, removing unnecessary code, and all sorts of things to generally improve the codebase. Why is this important, and what is the benefit to the organization? Without refactoring, code tends to become messy. Each new developer adds something new, code is duplicated, paradigms change, data models are updated, technologies are improved, etc. As these things happen, the application becomes increasingly difficult for developers to follow. Additionally, bugs increase, the size of the code increase, and things run less than optimally. In the end, refactoring is kind of like getting a tuneup on your car. As a good developer, I am always looking for ways to improve the code so that future developers will have an easier time maintaining the application. It’s incredibly important and should be a priority not only for developers but for management and customers as well.