programmatic-naming-convention-cheatsheet.md

Programmatic Naming Convention Cheat Sheet

This cheatsheet is, shockingly, for programmers using programming languages to program.
Below are examples of the best naming conventions used in the programming world.

Note

You may have different thoughts on this, but they are wrong.

It's time to get with the program... ☜(⌒▽⌒)☞
These are the naming conventions that have bubbled-up through the decades as the most proficient and ideal, which is why they are some common today.

So stick with them so we can all read code easier together!

Convention	Example #1	Example #2	Aliases
camelCase	listenerHTTP	graphQLHelper	dromedaryCase
PascalCase	ListenerHTTP	GraphQLHelper	ProperCase
snake_case	listener_http	graph_ql_helper
kebab-case	listener-http	graph-ql-helper	caterpillar-case
CONSTANT_CASE	LISTENER_HTTP	GRAPH_QL_HELPER	SCREAMING_CASE

Tip

File Names
kebab-case is the universal ideal for the names of files and their extensions following a dot separator.
MY FILE NAME.md ✗
My Proper File.md ✗
my-proper-file.md ✔

As you can see, that is 6 solid conventions that work great in nearly all situations. There is not a need for any new ones, they've all been tried by us programmers in the decades past.

Stop. Wasting. Everyone's. Time. and just stick to these.

Discouraged Naming Convensions

The following convensions are generally discouraged or considered legacy/not-ideal.

Some developers like to waste time by creating conventions that are a modification of those listed here, often calling out an UPPER or lower version as to indicate their new standard. This is stupid.

Here's a few more conventions that can now be classified as such in the modern era:

Convention	Example #1	Example #2	Aliases	Use Instead
COBOL-CASE	LISTENER-HTTP	GRAPH-QL-HELPER		➔ CONSTANT_CASE
dot.case	listener.http	graph.ql.helper		➔ kebab-case
lazyCamelCase	listenerHttp	graphQlHelper		➔ camelCase
Pascal_Snake_Case	Listener_HTTP	Graph_QL_Helper	Proper_Snake_Case	➔ snake_case
Train-Case	Listener-HTTP	Graph-QL-Helper	HTTP-Header-Case	➔ kebab-case

Prefixed & Suffixed Notations

In legacy codebases, you may find prefixes or suffixes to naming conventions used in a haphazard attempt to categorize variables. In many cases, the prefixes or suffixes are made (a poor choice of) convention by a library or framework.

Use instead proper architecture, convention, and documentation (such as JSDoc).

Notation	Example #1	Example #2	Aliases
__IDENT__	__LISTENER_HTTP__	__GRAPH_QL_HELPER__
$JQuery	$listenerHttp	$graphQlHelper
_privateNotReally	_listenerHttp	_graphQlHelper

If you find yourself doing this in a modern project... stop.

Conclusion

Now we can all get back to coding.