It really depends on how complex the thing is that you have n copies of in your codebase. Also, is it a concrete algorithm? Is it a pattern? A concrete algorith

It really depends on how complex the thing is that you have n copies of in your codebase. Also, is it a concrete algorithm? Is it a pattern? A concrete algorithm can usually be factored out more easily than a pattern, because the later needs to be flexible and extensible. Supporting all the variations of a pattern in a complex codebase in a single place can be challenging and in the end it may be harder to get right than maintaining the repetitive code.