Reminder: Frequently refactor your code
Over time, AI gets your code to be a mess. So you should regularly ask it to clean it up
Instead of asking Agent to "refactor the code", ask it to:
- Eliminate dead code: “Delete unused imports, variables, and functions; point out any test files that still call them.”
- Tighten dependencies: "List packages that are imported but never referenced, and suggest how to remove them from requirements."
- Kill duplication: “Detect code blocks duplicated ⩾ 3 times across modules; create a shared utility and update call sites.”
- Strengthen typing: “Add or refine type hints where ‘Any’ or missing annotations are found; flag places where typing uncovered a bug.”
- Demystify magic numbers: “Replace literals that look like config (timeouts, thresholds, etc.) with named constants in settings.py.”
- Improve architecture: "Identify features or sections of the app that could be extracted to a separate module."
You can also use these to target a specific part of the application
Note: the list is not exhaustive! Let me know if you want more material or a course about this