In our previous lesson, you learned how to eliminate duplicated code through method extraction and the refactoring of magic numbers in Ruby. This lesson builds upon that foundation by introducing another crucial refactoring technique: the Extract Method. This technique is vital for transforming long, complex methods into smaller, more manageable ones, enhancing both readability and maintainability. As we delve into this lesson, remember that our goal is to follow the Red, Green, Refactor workflow, ensuring that we can use our tests when refactoring to confirm that we have not changed anything regarding behavior. If you change behavior, it is not a successful refactor.

Long methods are a code smell that can hinder efficient development as they often become difficult to understand, test, and maintain. A method might be considered long if it handles multiple responsibilities, making the code harder to track and debug. This complexity can impede our ability to effectively refactor and validate code, as isolated testing of functionalities becomes more challenging. Our task is to identify such cumbersome methods and employ the Extract Method technique to break them down into smaller, focused sub-methods, each with a single responsibility.

Take a look at the following method. Notice how it is not only long, but it is also responsible for doing a lot of things. Can you identify the different things this method is responsible for defining?