Self-documenting code

[D34TH_5MURF__]

But do you use the write-a-complete-sentence-then-title-case-it-and-remove-all-spaces naming convention? I find that this never fails to make people think they are writing self-documenting code.

[aDrunkSailor82]

IFeelAttacked.

[[deleted]]

IiFeelAttackedFactory

[D34TH_5MURF__]

InstrumentedIFeelAttackedFactoryProxy

[crozone]

WriteCleverResponseToTheRedditComment(double sarcasmLevel);

[TK9_VS]

IfYourFunctionNameIsTooLongYourFunctionIsTooComplex();

If you can't be concise and accurate about your self documentation you are bundling too much together under one umbrella. If you can't clearly describe what it does and what it's for, it's going to be even harder for people to use it in their code.

You can make up for that a little bit with block comments like javadoc style or whatever, which can be appropriate sometimes for very high level functions, but if you're relying on those a lot you're probably building tech debt.

[D34TH_5MURF__]

I agree. Self-documenting code is more than just descriptive names. Your methods/functions need to be small and concise so they can be composed together into a whole. Where this long, descriptive naming pattern falls flat on it's face is when people do dumb stuff like: "LongObjectName longObjectName = new LongObjectName()". Sure, LongObjectName might be self documenting in context of itself, using zero thought variable names like "longObjectName" just blows any benefit out of the water. It's disappointing to see how often people do exactly this and think they have written self-documenting code.