Too many parsing, exploding, regex, strcomp, strpos and string manipulation functions.

TL;DR: Use real abstractions and real objects instead of string accidental manipulation.

Problems

Complexity
Readability
Maintainability
Lack of Abstractions

Solutions

1) Work with objects instead.

2) Replace strings with data structures dealing with object relations.

3) Go back to Perl :)

4) Find Bijection problems between real objects and the strings.

Examples

-Serializers

-Parsers

Sample Code

Wrong

<?

$schoolDescription = 'College of Springfield';

preg_match('/[^ ]*$/', $schoolDescription, $results);
$location = $results[0]; // $location = 'Springfield'.

$school = preg_split('/[\s,]+/', $schoolDescription, 3)[0]; //'College'

Right

<?

class School {

    private $name;
    private $location;

    function description() {
        return $this->name . ' of ' . $this->location->name;
    }

}

Detection

Automated detection is not easy. If code uses too many string functions it can trigger a warning.

Relations

Primitive Obsession

More info

Conclusion

Don't abuse strings. Favor real objects. Find absent protocol to distinguish them from strings.

Credits

Photo by Nathaniel Shuman on Unsplash

This article is part of the CodeSmell Series.

https://maximilianocontieri.com/how-to-find-the-stinky-parts-of-your-code

Last update: 2021/06/03

Code Smell 04 - String Abusers