Is it kEatSpeed or kSpeedEat?

Posted by bobobobo on Stack Overflow See other posts from Stack Overflow or by bobobobo
Published on 2010-05-07T22:03:51Z Indexed on 2010/05/07 22:08 UTC
Read the original article Hit count: 218

Filed under:

variable

|

naming

|

language-agnostic

I have a bunch of related constants that are not identical. What's the better way to name them?

way #1

kWalkSpeed
kRunSpeed
kEatSpeed
kDrinkSpeed

Or,

way #2

kSpeedWalk
kSpeedRun
kSpeedEat
kSpeedDrink

If we evaluate these based on

readability
understandability
not bug prone with subtle errors due to using wrong variable name

I think way #1 wins readability, they tie for understandability, and way #2 wins for not bug prone.

I'm not sure how often it happens to others, but when variable names like this get long, then its easy to write kSpeedEatingWhenInAHurry when you really meant kSpeedEatingWhenInHome, especially when using autocomplete.

Any perspectives?

© Stack Overflow or respective owner

Related posts about variable

PHP variable in variable

as seen on Stack Overflow - Search for 'Stack Overflow'
I have set an array in my config file that I use global in my functions. This works fine, but now I want to pass the name of this array as a @param in my function. // in config file: $album_type_arr = array("appartamento", "villa"); global $album_type_arr; // pull in from db_config echo $album_type_arr[0]; function… >>> More
JavaScript variable to ColdFusion variable

as seen on Stack Overflow - Search for 'Stack Overflow'
I have a tricky one. By means of a <cfoutput query="…"> I list some records in the page from a SQL Server database. By the end of each line viewing I try to add this in to a record in a MySQL database. As you see is simple, because I can use the exact variables from the output query in to… >>> More
Swapping two variable value without using 3rd variable

as seen on Stack Overflow - Search for 'Stack Overflow'
One of the very tricky question asked in an interview... we need to swap the values of two variables like a=10 and b=15 Generaly to swap two variables values, we need 3rd variable like.. temp=a a=b b=temp Now the requirement is, swaping value of two variable values without using 3rd variable… >>> More
PHP - Variable inside variable?

as seen on Stack Overflow - Search for 'Stack Overflow'
Hey guys... $bookA = "123"; $crack = "A"; I want to do something similar to this: echo $book$crack; Such that the output is 123. What is the correct syntax for the echo command? Thanks. >>> More
variable inside a variable in a php class

as seen on Stack Overflow - Search for 'Stack Overflow'
is it possible to copy a variable like this this? class Colours { var $var = "one"; var $var2 = array('something', $var); } >>> More

Related posts about naming

Use Glassfish JMS from remote client

as seen on Stack Overflow - Search for 'Stack Overflow'
Hi, I have glassfish installed on a server with a JMS ConnectionFactory set up jms/MyConnectionFactory with a resource type or javax.jms.ConnectionFactory. I now want to access this from a client application on my local machine for this I have the following: public static void main(String[] args)… >>> More
Naming conventions and field naming question for CakePHP

as seen on Stack Overflow - Search for 'Stack Overflow'
Okay so two questions very related: 1) Does following the naming convention for classes, controllers, database fields, etc. affect the framework's ability to work the way it was intended? (I'm a little new to working with a framework from the beginning of app development) 2) This question is more… >>> More
Python Naming Conventions for Dictionaries/Maps/Hashes

as seen on Stack Overflow - Search for 'Stack Overflow'
While other questions have tackled the broader category of sequences and modules, I ask this very specific question: "What naming convention do you use for dictionaries and why?" Some naming convention samples I have been considering: # 'value' is the data type stored in the map, while 'key' is… >>> More
Naming PowerPoint Components With A VSTO Add-In

as seen on Geeks with Blogs - Search for 'Geeks with Blogs'
Note: Cross posted from Coding The Document. Permalink Sometimes in order to work with Open XML we need a little help from other tools. In this post I am going to describe a fairly simple solution for marking up PowerPoint presentations so that they can be used as templates and processed using… >>> More
"Mac" vs "OS X" vs "Mac OS X"

as seen on Programmers - Search for 'Programmers'
I am writing server software that gives administrators options that apply only to Mac OS X clients. When naming those options, I need to decide how I am going to refer to such clients. I can see three choices: Mac OS X Mac OS X In context, I feel that "Mac OS X" might be a little clumsy: "Default… >>> More