maintenance.md

Recipe: Maintenance & Quality

Keeping the codebase clean is as important as adding features. RustAPI accumulates "dead code" easily when features are iterated on rapidly.

The Quality Script

We provide a unified script to handle linting, dead code detection, and testing.

.\scripts\check_quality.ps1

Handling Dead Code

The script runs cargo check with RUSTFLAGS="-W unused".

Scenario 1: It's actually dead

Action: Delete it. Don't comment it out. Git history remembers it if you need it back.

Scenario 2: It's for the future

Action: Use #[allow(dead_code)]. Be explicit.

#[allow(dead_code)] // Planned for phase 2
fn future_helper() { ... }

Scenario 3: False Positive

Struct fields that are only used in Debug impls or serialization might flag as unused. Action: Check if you really need that field. If yes, ignore the warning or derive Allow.

Linting (Clippy)

We enforce cargo clippy -- -D warnings in CI.

• Complexity: If clippy says a function is too complex, refactor it.
• Optimization: If clippy suggests a faster iterator method, take it.