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Instructor said my variable names looked like a cat walked on the keyboard, and it stung but she was right
Last fall I signed up for an intro Python class at the community college here in Boise, and about four weeks in I turned in a little number guessing game. I was proud of it until the instructor handed it back with a note that said my names like x2, ttl, and tmpA made her guess what everything did. At first I got defensive, because the code ran fine and that felt like the whole point. But then I had to go back into that same file two weeks later to add a score tracker, and I spent 20 solid minutes just figuring out what my own variables meant. That was the moment it clicked for me, because a name like total_guesses or player_score would have told me instantly. So I changed how I write everything now, even tiny practice scripts, and I say the name out loud in my head before I type it. I still catch myself being lazy sometimes, but going back to old code and not being confused is worth the extra typing. What finally made naming click for you, or do you just name stuff a and b until it breaks?
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cora2166d ago
Cat walked on the keyboard is brutal but honestly kind of fair, and the fact that you needed 20 minutes to decode your own tmpA two weeks later is the real lesson here. Naming stuff a and b works great right up until the moment future you opens the file and has zero clue what b was supposed to be. My rule these days is simple: if I have to stop and think about what a name means, it is a bad name. Half the "extra typing" is really just saving yourself from a headache later, so it pays for itself fast. Keep saying the name in your head before you type it, that trick works better than people admit.
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