From mboxrd@z Thu Jan 1 00:00:00 1970 X-Spam-Checker-Version: SpamAssassin 3.4.4 (2020-01-24) on polar.synack.me X-Spam-Level: X-Spam-Status: No, score=-0.5 required=5.0 tests=BAYES_05 autolearn=ham autolearn_force=no version=3.4.4 X-Google-Language: ENGLISH,ASCII-7-bit X-Google-Thread: 108717,ea99940253996e3e,start X-Google-Attributes: gid108717,public X-Google-Thread: 109fba,ea99940253996e3e,start X-Google-Attributes: gid109fba,public X-Google-Thread: f43e6,ea99940253996e3e,start X-Google-Attributes: gidf43e6,public X-Google-Thread: 103376,ea99940253996e3e,start X-Google-Attributes: gid103376,public X-Google-ArrivalTime: 2003-09-25 21:32:44 PST Path: archiver1.google.com!postnews1.google.com!not-for-mail From: andy.glew@amd.com (Andy Glew) Newsgroups: comp.software-eng,comp.programming,comp.lang.c++,comp.lang.ada Subject: ISO Studies of underscores vs MixedCase in Ada or C++ Date: 25 Sep 2003 21:32:40 -0700 Organization: http://groups.google.com/ Message-ID: <2cfd1a4e.0309252032.3e3c0a1a@posting.google.com> NNTP-Posting-Host: 139.95.251.9 Content-Type: text/plain; charset=ISO-8859-1 Content-Transfer-Encoding: 8bit X-Trace: posting.google.com 1064550763 13765 127.0.0.1 (26 Sep 2003 04:32:43 GMT) X-Complaints-To: groups-abuse@google.com NNTP-Posting-Date: 26 Sep 2003 04:32:43 GMT Xref: archiver1.google.com comp.software-eng:20790 comp.programming:63266 comp.lang.c++:245061 comp.lang.ada:42962 Date: 2003-09-26T04:32:43+00:00 List-Id: I am in search of any rigourous, scientific, academic or industrial studies comparing naming conventions in C++ or similar languages such as Ada: Specifically, are names formed with underscores more or less readable than names formed with MixedCase StudlyCaps camelCase? ...and similarly, any measurements of programmer productivity, bug rate, etc.; although IMHO readability matters most. * Religion - NOT?! I understand that this is a religious issue for many programmers, an issue of programming style. I am not interested in a religious war. I obviously have my own opinion, but I am open to scientific evidence. * Ada Studies? I thought that I had seen studies like this in some of the early design documents for Ada, but I have not been able to find such references on the web. Which is not entirely surprising, since Ada was designed prior to the web. The Ada 83 and 95 Quality Guidelines recommend underscores to improve readability, but provide no source justifying this statement. * What such studies might look like Simple readability and recall: - present a test subject with a list of compound words formed with underscoresand mixed case - remove the list, and ask test subject to write it - score on accuracy Program debugging - present programs that are otherwise identical, differing only in their use of underscores/MixedCase to test subject programmers (e.g. a CS class) - program has a known bug - ask test subjects to find bug - score on accuracy locating bug Cruel TA study: - Two sections of a CS class - Enforce programming standards, underscores vs MixedCase - Pose a programming problem - Score according to success completing assignment Empirical: - Given version control databases of large programs, some written in underscore style, others in MixedCase - Total bug rates normalized by LOC, name count, etc. - OR: count only bugs that can be attributed (after inspection of checkins) to misnamed variables For that matter, I would be interested in any surveys folks may have done that count projects and their coding standards, possibly weighted - open source (e.g. sourceforge) - industrial - textbooks, weighted by sales - websites of coding standards, weighted by Google score... Although this is less convincing than a rigorous study. * Explanation of Newsgroups Chosen I hope it is obvious why I have chosen these newsgroups to post this search to: comp.software-eng, comp.programming, - an issue of software engineering comp.lang.c++, - the language I am most interested in comp.lang.ada - because I vaguely recall historical work