Tech tips: Practical tricks to code faster and work smarter

Tired of redoing the same fixes and losing time to tiny mistakes? Tech tips should cut your work, not add jargon. Below you’ll find clear, ready-to-use moves for coding, debugging, and using AI tools so you spend less time fumbling and more time shipping.

Quick wins to speed up coding

Pick one habit and repeat it until it sticks. Start with a formatter and linter: use Black for Python or Prettier for JavaScript and enable the linter in your editor. That removes style bikeshedding and saves review time.

Use small, focused commits and git add -p to stage chunks. When a bug shows up, a tight commit history makes it easier to bisect and spot the change that broke things.

Templates and snippets are underrated. Save common class headers, test setups, or API call patterns as editor snippets. You’ll type less and avoid copy-paste errors.

Debugging and testing that actually work

Reproduce the bug with a minimal test first. If you can write a unit test that fails consistently, you’ve already narrowed the problem. Use pytest -k to run just that test while you iterate.

Read stack traces top to bottom and add a focused log or breakpoint where the trace first shows your code. Logging with structured fields (user_id, request_id) makes issues reproducible in production logs.

Automate basic checks with CI: run linters, formatters, and tests on every push. That catches simple regressions before they reach code review.

Want keyboard speed? Learn three editor shortcuts that save you the most time: duplicate line, move line up/down, and multi-cursor edit. Use them until they feel natural—your fingers will thank you.

Use feature flags for risky changes. Roll out behind a flag, test in production, and kill the flag if something breaks. Safer releases, less emergency debugging.

Use a consistent branch naming scheme and a short PR template that asks for a one-sentence summary, testing steps, and a rollback plan. Reviewers will thank you and reviews get faster.

AI tools can speed things up, but treat them like helpers, not answers. Give a short context, show a failing test or sample input, and ask for a specific change. Always run the code and read it; AI often suggests plausible but wrong details.

Try this: pick one tip—formatters, focused tests, or a single editor shortcut—and apply it to your next task. Small changes compound fast. Do that for a month and you’ll notice fewer late-night bug hunts and more steady progress.