Access™ 2007 VBA Programmer's Reference

L.1. Why Implement Naming Conventions?

As previously indicated, the use of naming conventions is voluntary, and developers can and do write applications without applying (or enforcing) naming conventions. However, conventions can save a lot of time and money, and can prevent needless frustrations by making it easier and faster to read and interpret code, whether it is code that you wrote last week or last year, or code from another developer.

Naming conventions offer many benefits in that they are like sharing a common language. Typically, that is important if the application is shared, but it's also essential to the individual developer who has to work with a program that he hasn't seen for a couple of years. Following are some of the most common benefits of using a naming convention:

• They make object names more informative so developers can quickly understand an application's structure and code.

• They provide a standardized vocabulary for team efforts.

• They minimize conflicts when adding third-party products.

• They allow code, tools, and code libraries to be shared across various VBA platforms.

• They group objects and facilitate various sort options.

• They can provide self-documenting program code.

• They enhance search and replace capabilities.

• They enable you to learn, modify, and incorporate code from others, including from magazines, reference books, the Internet, and peers.

Naming conventions need to be an integral part of the basic design, and they should be fully adopted before one ...