Jonathan M Davis wrote:
> On Thursday, September 15, 2011 09:46:13 Jens Mueller wrote:
> > Jonathan M Davis wrote:
> > > On Wednesday, September 14, 2011 16:12 Jens Mueller wrote:
> > > > Jonathan M Davis wrote:
> > > > > On Wednesday, September 14, 2011 15:36 dsimcha wrote:
> > > > > > On 9/14/2011 5:24 PM, Vladimir Panteleev wrote:
> > > > > > > Tiny nitpick: case of "GC" in type/enum names should
> > > > > > > probably match for consistency.
> > > > > > 
> > > > > > Good point. Do we even have a convention for acronyms in
> > > > > > variable/type names? If so is it GcAllocator or
> > > > > > GCAllocator?
> > > > > 
> > > > > We haven't been entirely consistent. For instance, we have
> > > > > UtfException, but _every_ other case of utf in the code is
> > > > > either utf (at the beginning of a function) or UTF (I have a
> > > > > pull request which includes fixing the casing on UtfException
> > > > > to match everything else). Given the choice, I'd definitely say
> > > > > that GC should be used and not Gc, and everywhere in Phobos
> > > > > where I've created a function which had an acronym in it,
> > > > > that's what I've done, but without going through the whole code
> > > > > base, I don't know which convention is more common (other than
> > > > > the case of Utf where I did go looking; it's easier when you
> > > > > know what the acronym is rather than looking for _all_
> > > > > acronyms). I don't think that acronyms have been all that
> > > > > common in general though.
> > > > 
> > > > When I had first glance at GCAllocator I observed this as well. I
> > > > believe GcAlloctor is the better way to camelize it even though
> > > > druntime has a class GC. It's easier to read for me, consider
> > > > XMLToHTMLConverter vs. XmlToHtmlConverter or worse XMLHTMLConverter
> > > > vs. XmlHtmlConverter. See
> > > > http://stackoverflow.com/questions/1176950/acronyms-in-camel-back> 
> > > Actually, I find XMLToHTMLConverter to be more legible than
> > > XmlToHtmlConverter, because XML and HTML are pretty much always
> > > capitalized everywhere else, and so Xml and Html are unfamiliar and
> > > jarring. Acronyms are meant to be capitalized. So, the natural thing to
> > > do is to put them in all caps in camelcased names. The problem is that
> > > you then end up with stuff like XMLTo where the first part of the next
> > > word in the name is capitalized but isn't part of the acronym, which is
> > > a bit funny. It's completely consistent and legible that way though.
> > > There's no confusion over whether the T is part of XML or not. It's
> > > just arguably a bit ugly. But _not_ capitalizing acronyms is generally
> > > far more hideous IMHO and makes them harder to read, because they're
> > > pretty much always capitalized everywhere else.
> > 
> > I think that are capitalized everywhere else because they are separated
> > by spaces in these cases.
> > But how about XMLHTMLConverter? Because I believe you then have to
> > accept this as well without making the rule complicated. Also your
> > argument is only valid for acronyms you know already. What does a
> > DSAFUSLConverter do? I just made this to illustrate the point.
> 
> Part of what you have to do is pick good names. XMLHTMLConverter is a bad 
> name 
> regardless of how you capitalize it. Acronyms are usually capitalized because 
> they stand for something. It's highly abnormal _not_ to capitalize them. 
> Spaces have nothing to do with it. One of the few places that that ever 
> happens is in symbol names in some programs, because the programmers involved 
> thought that it was ugly to have that many capital letters in a row. Outside 
> of programming, not capitalizing them is rare, and inside of programming, it 
> depends on who's writing the code.
> 
> Personally, I do _not_ like it when acronyms have mixed capitalization, and I 
> think that symbol names with fully capitalized acronyms are just fine. You 
> just 
> need to be smart about what you name your symbols - which you should be doing 
> anyway.

Either way it'll be nice to have this fixed in the style guide. Even
though I prefer the Java/.NET convention for acronyms. Maybe we can just
decide this and move on.

Jens

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