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Refactoring: Improving the Design of Existing Code

by Martin Fowler, Kent Beck, John Brant, William Opdyke, and Don Roberts · 1999

The first-edition guide to improving existing code through behavior-preserving transformations, with a catalog of refactorings.

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Kent BeckBook author

Author credited for a Steve Blank Books for Startups catalog title.

John BrantAuthor

William OpdykeAuthor

Don RobertsAuthor

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Refactoring: Improving the Design of Existing Code appears in 1 currently documented source-backed recommendation.

Portrait unavailable for David Heinemeier Hansson David Heinemeier Hansson Ruby on Rails creator and 37signals co-owner
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Documented citation: David Heinemeier Hansson recommends studying and applying the patterns in Refactoring.

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Signal v. Noise / Basecamp · 2012-12-26 · accessed 2026-10-01

article · Own programming-book recommendation

Explicit reader instruction in own list; source predates the 2018 second edition, so the 1999 first edition and its full contributor credits are cataloged.

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