code-review

Code Review

Review code changes for quality, correctness, style, and potential issues. Provide clear, actionable feedback that helps the author improve their code.

Inputs

• Target: A diff, pull request, set of changed files, or specific code selection
• Context (optional): Project coding standards, language-specific conventions, or reference documents to apply during review

Steps

1. Identify the scope — Determine which files and changes are under review. If reviewing a PR or diff, read all changed files. If reviewing a selection, focus on the highlighted code and its immediate context.

2. Understand intent — Before critiquing, understand what the code is trying to accomplish. Read commit messages, PR descriptions, or surrounding code for context.

3. Review for correctness — Check for:

   • Logic errors and off-by-one mistakes
   • Unhandled edge cases and error conditions
   • Race conditions or concurrency issues
   • Incorrect assumptions about inputs or state

4. Review for security — Check for:

   • Injection vulnerabilities (SQL, XSS, command injection)
   • Improper input validation at system boundaries
   • Hardcoded secrets or credentials
   • Insecure defaults or configurations

5. Review for quality — Check for:

   • Code clarity and readability
   • Unnecessary complexity or over-engineering
   • Duplicated logic that should be consolidated
   • Naming that accurately describes purpose
   • Consistent style with the surrounding codebase

6. Review for performance — Check for:

   • Unnecessary allocations or computations in hot paths
   • N+1 query patterns or unbounded data fetching
   • Missing indexes or inefficient data structures
   • Resource leaks (connections, file handles, memory)

7. Review for maintainability — Check for:

   • Breaking changes to public APIs
   • Missing or outdated tests for changed behavior
   • Tight coupling that will make future changes harder
   • Dead code or unused imports introduced by the change