Relay-Version: version B 2.10 5/3/83; site utzoo.UUCP Path: utzoo!watmath!clyde!burl!mgnetp!ihnp4!mhuxl!houxm!houxz!vax135!cornell!uw-beaver!tektronix!hplabs!sri-unix!moss@BRL-VLD.ARPA From: moss@BRL-VLD.ARPA Newsgroups: net.unix Subject: Re: long variable names Message-ID: <12225@sri-arpa.UUCP> Date: Wed, 8-Aug-84 08:55:16 EDT Article-I.D.: sri-arpa.12225 Posted: Wed Aug 8 08:55:16 1984 Date-Received: Sat, 11-Aug-84 00:55:46 EDT Lines: 27 From: "Gary S. Moss (DRXBR-VLD-V)"Did I say 8 characters? It goes without saying that the pre-pended underscore is included and its good practice to leave a safety margin of a couple of characters 'cause you never know, but I started out on an 11/70 and its 'C' compilers (a v7 and Doug Gwyn's System V emulation) recognize 7 characters not counting the underscore, so don't attribute the stupid behavior to the machine if yours only recognized 6. But seriously, let's not quibble numbers, I am no expert on available compilers, just follow the unique portion of the variable name with something meaningful. Worse comes to worse and it often does, define some mnemonics in a comment. /* The following abbreviations are imbedded in the local variable names. ht - hash table dl - display list ll - linked-list dr - device register */ struct ht_object_names { ... } ht_solids[NSOL], ht_regions[NREG]; DL_Word dl_temp[DL_SIZE]; ... Of course you can save characters by using uppercase rather than underscores to delimit portions of the names (i.e. htObjSolid rather than ht_obj_solid). -- Moss.