Streamlining .Net Development: Effective Practices

Effective software development requires a well-organized and controlled engineering process, especially when working with .Net technology, which is popular in backend development. To achieve a high-quality codebase and control the engineering process for the .Net tech stack, it’s essential to implement various practices and be ready to adjust your strategy anytime. In this article, we will explore techniques we successfully used for .Net development.

.Net development: effective practices

Our team has investigated many approaches to .Net development, and we would like to share the practices we found to be the most effective and beneficial for relevant projects.

Development process

For a structured .Net development, we mainly base our approach on Scrum, allowing our team to adapt quickly to changing requirements. The Scrum process involves several key events, including Sprint Planning, Daily Scrum, Sprint Review, and Sprint Retrospective. These events help us stay aligned, communicate effectively, and continuously improve our activities.

Sprint duration and planning

We propose a sprint duration of two weeks, during which the team conducts a demo for all stakeholders to showcase the features or defect fixes made during the sprint. Before each sprint, we conduct a Sprint Planning meeting with all stakeholders to define a set of stories and priorities for the upcoming sprint. Such a performance management plan helps us stay aligned, communicate effectively, and deliver value to our clients quickly.

Testing

Testing is crucial to the .Net development process, ensuring our codebase is robust and stable. For every new functionality or defect fix, we enforce Unit Testing. We also verify that any changes in the codebase do not break existing Unit Tests, allowing us to keep the codebase in an instant working state. This approach helps us catch any issues early on and reduces the likelihood of introducing new bugs.

Continuous integration

Continuous Integration involves integrating code changes into a shared repository frequently. We plan to use continuous integration based on Azure Pipelines. This server will automatically run all test harnesses on every developer commit, including Unit Tests, UI Tests, and Integration Tests. Thus, we’ll be able to catch issues early on, ensure the stability of the codebase, and reduce the time it takes to detect and fix bugs.

Static analysis

Our development team uses static analysis enabled in Xcode and .Net environments with extensive verifications covering the most common mistakes during the development. This approach helps us ensure the quality of the codebase and identify potential issues, including security, memory management, and semantic correctness of usage of system API.

Coding style

Consistency in the codebase is crucial for efficient collaboration among team members. We enforce our project’s coding style using built-in code-style analysis configuration for .Net. It helps us maintain a consistent coding style across the codebase, making it easier for developers to work on each other’s code and reduce the likelihood of new bugs.

Code review

We follow a pre-commit code review technique, where other team members review code changes before committing to the codebase. For code reviews, we follow the GitHub flow Pull Requests process when using GitHub. Thus, we can maintain high codebase quality, share knowledge across team members, and ensure continuity of expertise over the codebase.

While the above techniques may require additional effort and resources, they pay off in the long run by reducing the time it takes to detect and fix bugs, increasing collaboration among team members, and improving the overall software quality. By following these practices, our team achieves similar results and produces high-quality software promptly and efficiently.