Re: Warning: Religious naming convention discussion :-) [was: assign help!!]

["John G. Volan" <johnvolan@sprintmail.com>]

Robert Dewar wrote:
> 
> <<I think this is an important point.  For identifiers that have small scope,
> almost any name will do if it has some mnemonic value.  Because I don't like
> to even remember which abbreviation was chosen, I use single letter variable
> names for temporaries in small functions whenever possible.>>
> 
> For me that goes too far, I have seen far too much code with cryptic
> one letter identifiers like D, where short names would have helped a
> lot (something like Depth). Interestingly, I note that this preference
> for one letter identifiers often seems to go along with an allergy to
> writing comments.

Robert, can you see how your relaxed attitude towards small scopes can
be abused by other programmers, and lead us down this slippery slope?  I
have been trying to make a distinction between two different kinds of
abbreviations: (1) conventional abbreviations, which are established at
a project level, documented, and used consistently and universally; and
(2) ad hoc abbreviations, which are invented on the spot, idiosyncratic,
and inconsistent.  Often times, one engineer will choose one ad hoc
abbreviation and another will choose and entirely different one -- for
the same concept! Chaos!

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