Best Practices for Writing Compose Code
Article Summary
GJ Kooijmans from Just Eat Takeaway compares writing software to Bruce Springsteen's E Street Band. Both succeed by composing simple parts into harmonious wholes—but most developers struggle with the composition part.
This article breaks down function composition principles using JavaScript examples, drawing from Eric Elliott's book 'Composing Software.' Kooijmans argues that learning to compose code properly is the difference between maintainable software and projects held together with duct tape.
Key Takeaways
- Function composition passes each function's result as the next function's argument
- Separating concerns with pipe and trace utilities makes code more debuggable
- Single-responsibility functions reduce noise and improve code readability
- Currying creates function pipelines connecting outputs to inputs seamlessly
Critical Insight
Mastering function composition makes your code structured, scalable, and understandable by breaking complex problems into simple, composable solutions.
