It’s a common industry practice for applications to utilize and reuse codes written by other programmers. Although it’s an efficient way of building applications, you might not be fully aware of the vulnerabilities in the code, since it’s not yours, to begin with. That’s where External Code Audits come into the picture. It takes that unknown out of the equation.
Apart from spotting errors and improving your code external audits will also help you understand the underlying composition, licensing, and obligations. In this blog, we’ll uncover why it’s important to conduct external code audits.We have also covered Code Review best practices in our earlier blog. Read it here.
Improved programming quality
Source code reviews are as important as QA. It not only ensures the highest code quality but also makes it easier for developers to improve overall software performance and add new features for expansion. Improved quality of code and optimized performance means, no need to allocate critical time and resources to solve technical issues and errors.
External code audits may also help surface any code debt which came as a result of using code created by other developers.
It saves you money
The time taken for bug detection is related to the fixing costs. Therefore, the longer it takes to detect the bugs, the costlier it gets. You can significantly reduce the cost of development by simply detecting bugs as early as possible. External code audits bring in extra hands to multiply audit efforts and cut the time by a significant margin, providing a direct cost advantage.
External developers can easily detect mistakes made by other developers, as it’s fresh for them and they have no other obligation other than shipping the best possible version of that code.
Streamlines development
When an engineer (not just developers) does one thing a million times, it gets harder to see subtle mistakes and efficient alternatives. That’s why QA engineers, editors, and supervisors are there. External code audits can help surface inefficiencies in the code and mistakes that go undetected. If given a pass, these mistakes can cause critical development issues and undermine the project management.
Helps upskill new coders
If you have new and less experienced developers in your team, external code audits can be eye-opening. It can help them improve their skill and learn about different modules, workarounds, and coding practices. Through this practice, the newcomers can come out as experienced coders after learning from their mistakes pointed out during the reviews.
Improves Project estimation accuracy
Reviewers performing code audits are people who are very familiar with the codebase you’re dealing with. There is a great chance that they already know the underlying common issues with the codebase and can recommend solutions based on the complexity of your project. Knowing about the issues and possible workarounds beforehand will give you an edge and help you make more precise project estimates, in terms of cost, time, and resources.
Consistent code across the software
When you’re working on complex projects, consistency becomes a challenge. Code audits help maintain consistency in your code throughout the software development project. External developers will keep a watchful eye on the coding style and any other element that needs to be consistent for better understanding and easier transitions in the future.
Conclusion
Software development, like any other process, is collaborative and when things exchange hands, it creates room for flaws. External code audits eliminate those possibilities while optimizing and speeding up development in the process.
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