AvoidConditionalLogicInModules

Avoid conditional logic in modules

It’s tempting to create modules that have moving parts and can be configured to operate differently for different environments:

public class FooModule extends AbstractModule {
  private final String fooServer;

  public FooModule() {
    this(null);
  }

  public FooModule(@Nullable String fooServer) {
    this.fooServer = fooServer;
  }

  @Override protected void configure() {
    if (fooServer != null) {
      bind(String.class).annotatedWith(ServerName.class).toInstance(fooServer);
      bind(FooService.class).to(RemoteFooService.class);
    } else {
      bind(FooService.class).to(InMemoryFooService.class);
    }
  }
}

Conditional logic in itself isn't too bad. But problems arise when configurations are untested. In this example, theInMemoryFooService is used for development and RemoteFooService is used in production. But without testing this specific case, it's impossible to be sure that RemoteFooService works in the integrated application.

To overcome this, minimize the number of distinct configurations in your applications. If you split production and development into distinct modules, it is easier to be sure that the entire production codepath is tested. In this case, we split FooModule into RemoteFooModule and InMemoryFooModule. This also prevents production classes from having a compile-time dependency on test code.

Another, related, issue with the example above: sometimes there's a binding for @ServerName String, and sometimes that binding is not there. You should avoid sometimes binding a key, and other times not.