I listened intently to the new Oracle programmer as he described all the struggles he’s been having on his first big project. As I’ve done many times already in his short career, I interrupt with some words of wisdom.

“It’s time to add Global Temporary Tables to your toolbelt.”

“What are those?” he asks, as he opens the directory with the Oracle documentation. I smile. He has already learned

Very, very few of us write perfect programs the first time, or the second time, or…. You get the idea. Our code is never perfect and can always be improved. Martin Fowler developed a technique he calls “refactoring,” and it has become quite popular in the world of Java.