Software Engineers Handbook/Supporting Processes/Coding Standards

Here is the wikipedia entry for coding standards.

Coding standards generally contain a set of conventions for a specific language. Items typically covered are:

• Naming conventions including:
  • how descriptive and long the names should be,
  • what the capitalization scheme should be, and
  • what the postfix and prefix conventions are.
• Physical organization, such as Definitions shall be located in the header files. and Do not include more than one class in one file.
• Structure conventions, such as Opening and closing braces shall be located in the same column like this:

{
    {
        // code in here
    }
}

• Style guides, such as Classes containing pointers shall have a virtual destructor. It is useful to include the reasoning and references for this type of standard.
• Legacy code guidance, such as When editing existing code, follow the coding naming and structure conventions of the existing code.

C++

• www.possibility.com coding standard
• www.chris-lott.org standard
• Effective C++: 55 Specific Ways to Improve Your Programs and Designs by Scott Meyers ISBN 0321334876 is a reference for creating style guides.
• More Effective C++: 35 New Ways to Improve Your Programs and Designs by Scott Meyers ISBN 020163371X is a reference for creating style guides.

Java

• java.sun.com coding conventions

C

• Gnu coding standards

Eiffel

• ww.cs.unc.edu standard

Naming conventions

"Always, always, always use good, unabbreviated, correctly-spelled meaningful names." -- c2: MeaningfulName

Popular naming conventions (naming formats) include:

• ALL_UPPERCASE_WITH_UNDERSCORES
• all_lowercase_with_underscores
• CamelCase
• uppercaseOnlyInTheMiddle
• _UnderscorePrefixedCamelCase
• Camel_Case_With_Underscores

For surprisingly long conversations about naming conventions, see c2: UnderscoreVersusCapitalAndLowerCaseVariableNaming; Wikipedia: CamelCase; c2: CamelCase; and "Underscores vs CamelCase".

Further reading

• See C++ Programming/Weblinks#C++ Coding Conventions for many more C++ coding conventions.