Code Smell 65 — Variables Named After Types

Names should always indicate role.

Photo by Sangga Rima Roman Selia on Unsplash

Problems

• Declarative
• Design for Change
• Coupling to accidental implementation

Solutions

1. Rename your variable according to the role.

Sample Code

Wrong

Right

Detection

This is a semantic rule. We can instruct our linters to warn us from using names related to existing classes, types o reserved words since they are too implementative.

Tags

• Declarative

Conclusion

The first name we can across is related to an accidental point of view. It takes time to build a theory on the models we are building using our MAPPERS. Once we get there, we must rename our variables-

Relations

Code Smell 38 — Abstract Names

More info

What exactly is a name? — Part II: Rehab

Intent Revealing Name

Credits

This idea came from this tweet

Types are essentially assertions about a program. And I think it’s valuable to have things be as absolutely simple as possible, including not even saying what the types are.

Dan Ingalls

Software Engineering Great Quotes

This article is part of the CodeSmell Series.

How to Find the Stinky parts of your Code