On 6 June 2017 09:17:31 BST, Tony Marston <tonymars...@hotmail.com> wrote: >"Rowan Collins" wrote in message >news:3351770b-c53e-4062-a91a-d3aa7439f...@gmail.com... >> >>On 5 June 2017 09:14:47 BST, Tony Marston <tonymars...@hotmail.com> >wrote: >>>Seriously, can you explain in words of one syllable the precise >>>benefits of >>>such a consistency? >> >>I will try: >> >>- When we write code, we need to know how to spell the names of >things. If >>the things all have names that look the same, it is less hard for us >to >>guess what the name is. This means we take less time to learn the >names, >>and get less things wrong. > >Words and abbreviations are spelled the same whether you use snake_case >or >CamelCase, the only difference is how you show the boundary between one >word >and the next. Studies have shown that snake_case is more readable than >CamelCase. > >>- Our brains are made to spot when things are the same, and when >things are >>not the same. When one thing is not like the things near it, we think >"why >>is that?" This slows us down. > >Seeing a name written in snake_case does not slow you down. In normal >writing there is a space between each word, but as names in software >cannot >have embedded spaces. This is why underscores are used, and this is >infinitely more readable than replacing spaces with a capital letter. > >>- When we get things wrong, we need to find out what we did wrong. If >one >>way to write a name is wrong, we can spot when we wrote it that way, >and >>know that it is wrong. > >Writing a name wrong has nothing to do with the difference between >snake_case and CamelCase. My IDE will show me existing names that match >what >I am typing as soon as I start typing, so I can easily pick the name >that I >want. > >>- If we make two things that mean the same thing, but do not look the >same, >>we might not spot that we wrote a third thing that does not mean the >same >>thing. > >If you try to instantiate a class that does not exist, or call a >method/function which does not exist, then you will soon know about it. > >Using snake_case instead of CamelCase does not invite more errors. > >>I think there are more things that make it good to have names that >look the >>same, but I hope this helps for now. > >The only universally accepted "rule" for names is that they be unique >and >convey proper meaning. In proper languages all names are >case-insensitive as >the ability to write the same name with the exact same spelling but >different case is simply inviting disaster.
Hi Tony, I think it's clear at this point that we're never going to agree here. We don't seem to even agree what the topic of discussion is - consistency in general? CamelCase in general? Richard's RFC? the authority to choose things? etc More importantly, we're not going to change the minds of the people who will actually make this decision by filling the list up with our debates. We're just wasting our own time and everyone else's, so I'm going to stop here. Regards, -- Rowan Collins [IMSoP] -- PHP Internals - PHP Runtime Development Mailing List To unsubscribe, visit: http://www.php.net/unsub.php
