Coding conventions

Coding conventions are a set of guidelines for a specific programming language that recommend programming style, practices, and methods for each aspect of a program written in that language.

Description

These conventions usually cover file organization, indentation, comments, declarations, statements, white space, naming conventions, programming practices, programming principles, programming rules of thumb, architectural best practices, etc.

These are guidelines for software structural quality. Software programmers are highly recommended to follow these guidelines to help improve the readability of their source code and make software maintenance easier.

Coding conventions are only applicable to the human maintainers and peer reviewers of a software project.

Conventions may be formalized in a documented set of rules that an entire team or company follows, or may be as informal as the habitual coding practices of an individual.

Coding conventions are not enforced by compilers.

See also

• Comparison of programming languages (syntax)
• Hungarian Notation
• Indent style
• List of tools for static code analysis
• MISRA C
• Naming convention
• Naming convention (programming)
• Programming style
• Readability
• Software maintenance
• Source code

External links

• Coding conventions @ Wikipedia