Coding Standards & Best Practices

Universal coding standards applicable across all projects.

When to Activate

• Reviewing code for quality and maintainability
• Refactoring existing code to follow conventions
• Enforcing naming, formatting, or structural consistency
• Setting up linting, formatting, or type-checking rules

Framework-Specific Patterns

If the task involves a specific framework, use the dedicated skill instead of this file:

Framework	Skill	Covers
React	skill: react-patterns	Components, Hooks, Zustand, performance, anti-patterns
Vue 3	skill: vue-patterns	Composition API, Pinia, composables, performance, anti-patterns

This skill focuses on framework-agnostic standards: naming, types, error handling, file organization, API design.

Reference Files

Topic	File	When to read
API Design	references/api-design.md	Designing REST APIs, response formats, validation
Testing & Code Smells	references/testing.md	Writing tests, detecting anti-patterns

Code Quality Principles

1. Readability First

• Code is read more than written
• Clear variable and function names
• Self-documenting code preferred over comments
• Consistent formatting

2. KISS (Keep It Simple, Stupid)

• Simplest solution that works
• Avoid over-engineering
• No premature optimization
• Easy to understand > clever code

3. DRY (Don't Repeat Yourself)

• Extract common logic into functions
• Create reusable components
• Share utilities across modules
• Avoid copy-paste programming

4. YAGNI (You Aren't Gonna Need It)

• Don't build features before they're needed
• Avoid speculative generality
• Add complexity only when required
• Start simple, refactor when needed

TypeScript/JavaScript Standards

Variable Naming

// ✅ GOOD: Descriptive names
const marketSearchQuery = 'election'
const isUserAuthenticated = true
const totalRevenue = 1000

// ❌ BAD: Unclear names
const q = 'election'
const flag = true
const x = 1000

Function Naming

// ✅ GOOD: Verb-noun pattern
async function fetchMarketData(marketId: string) { }
function calculateSimilarity(a: number[], b: number[]) { }
function isValidEmail(email: string): boolean { }

// ❌ BAD: Unclear or noun-only
async function market(id: string) { }
function similarity(a, b) { }
function email(e) { }

Immutability Pattern

// ✅ ALWAYS use spread operator
const updatedUser = { ...user, name: 'New Name' }
const updatedArray = [...items, newItem]

// ❌ NEVER mutate directly
user.name = 'New Name'  // BAD
items.push(newItem)     // BAD

Error Handling

// ✅ GOOD: Comprehensive error handling
async function fetchData(url: string) {
  try {
    const response = await fetch(url)
    if (!response.ok) {
      throw new Error(`HTTP ${response.status}: ${response.statusText}`)
    }
    return await response.json()
  } catch (error) {
    console.error('Fetch failed:', error)
    throw new Error('Failed to fetch data')
  }
}

Async/Await Best Practices

// ✅ GOOD: Parallel execution when possible
const [users, markets, stats] = await Promise.all([
  fetchUsers(),
  fetchMarkets(),
  fetchStats()
])

// ❌ BAD: Sequential when unnecessary
const users = await fetchUsers()
const markets = await fetchMarkets()
const stats = await fetchStats()

Type Safety

// ✅ GOOD: Proper types
interface Market {
  id: string
  name: string
  status: 'active' | 'resolved' | 'closed'
  created_at: Date
}

function getMarket(id: string): Promise<Market> { }

// ❌ BAD: Using 'any'
function getMarket(id: any): Promise<any> { }

File Organization

Project Structure

src/
├── app/                    # Next.js App Router
│   ├── api/               # API routes
│   └── (auth)/            # Auth pages (route groups)
├── components/            # React components
│   ├── ui/               # Generic UI components
│   ├── forms/            # Form components
│   └── layouts/          # Layout components
├── hooks/                # Custom React hooks
├── lib/                  # Utilities and configs
├── types/                # TypeScript types
└── styles/              # Global styles

File Naming

components/Button.tsx          # PascalCase for components
hooks/useAuth.ts              # camelCase with 'use' prefix
lib/formatDate.ts             # camelCase for utilities
types/market.types.ts         # camelCase with .types suffix

Comments & Documentation

// ✅ GOOD: Explain WHY, not WHAT
// Use exponential backoff to avoid overwhelming the API during outages
const delay = Math.min(1000 * Math.pow(2, retryCount), 30000)

// ❌ BAD: Stating the obvious
// Increment counter by 1
count++

Remember: Code quality is not negotiable. Clear, maintainable code enables rapid development and confident refactoring.