>I just think of refactoring being to the coding process as editing and rewriting is to writing process. Sometimes it is a good idea to go back and look at something you've written before and see if it reads as well cold as it did hot and if you'd say it differently now that you have the context of the rest of the piece.
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I like that analogy. (You knew I would, right, given my various experiences.) Real writing, that is, writing for publication or for preservation of any sort (documentation, for example) requires editing. Not just proof-reading, but a real consideration of the structure and the organization.

Debugging, I think, can be seen as analogous to proof-reading. Refactoring, then, is editing.

Tamar