Names in programming

[NikosAlexandris]

Reading #1868 made me flashback to the https://online.rice.edu/courses/computer-fundamentals courses I completed years ago. While working on numerous small programs and tests, during the courses, appropriate naming of program functions was a must-do, explained and supported with real-world examples of bad naming practices that ultimately lead to programs that were not understandable/consistent.

I was curious to see what Donald E. Knuth writes about names in his ever ongoing book The Art of Computer Programming [1]. Two relevant references in The MMIX supplement : supplement to The art of computer programming [2]:

I know of no better way to teach a student to think like a top computer scientist than to ground everything in a firm knowledge of how a computing machine actually works. This bottom-up approach seems to be the best way to help nurture an ability to navigate fluently between levels.

I think these words are more than relevant in practising good naming conventions in programming and thus, by doing so, be open, friendly, inviting and educative for everyone.

Choosing good names is one of the most important and most difficult tasks when writing programs, especially if the programs are intended for publication. Good names need to be consistent and so this section starts with some simple rules that guided how names in this book where chosen.
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[..] The single-letter style of mathematics leads to rather terse programs. This style is appropriate if the exposition is mostly mathematical and the implementation has to convince the reader that it embodies the right mathematics. If the program describes the manipulation of "real-world objects," a more verbose style using descriptive names such as card or title will improve readability.

This second reference is clear and unambiguous. I guess there is nothing wrong with short names for functions and parameters. Yet they should be names, full names. Half-spelled words are not full names. How does one ensure that a composition of 2 or 3 half spelled words, that indeed may make sense to a single programmer, are serving the public? Considering that the biggest time in programming is spent in actually reading code, programmers should indeed take appropriate, meaningful, easy-to-read names in programming seriously and be more respectful to the public reader (the student, the scripter, the curious, the new coming core developer). Even more so in an open source project, part of whose development model is exactly public access to its source.

References

[1] Contributors to Wikimedia projects. "The Art of Computer Programming - Wikipedia." 15 Sept. 2021, en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=The_Art_of_Computer_Programming&oldid=1044441966.

[2] Ruckert, Martin, and Donald E. Knuth. The MMIX supplement : supplement to The art of computer programming volumes 1, 2, 3 by Donald E. Knuth. Upper Saddle River, NJ: Addison-Wesley, 2015.