C++ developers are famously bad at naming: our idioms, guidelines, and lore are rich in examples of terrible names. For example, consider RAII, which stands for scope bound resource management, or west const which perhaps should be const west, or all the samples that feature an object called x which is an instance of a class called X, and so on.

The good news is that naming well is a learned skill, and you can learn it, and start to name better right away. In this talk, I’ll tell you why names matter, what benefits a good name can bring, and how to be better at naming. I’ll discuss some categories of names and some common decisions within those categories. I’m not going to give you a set of rules to follow: this is about thinking and considering the meaning of the things you are naming. I will give you some questions to ask yourself and some structure that I use to help me to help those who read what I write.

I’ll also address renaming things in existing (legacy) code, why and when to do it, and why getting it right the first time may not even be a realistic goal. You should be a lot more confident naming things after we spend this time together.

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Originally presented at CppCon 2019

CppCon is the annual, week-long face-to-face gathering for the entire C++ community. The conference is organized by the C++ community for the community. You will enjoy inspirational talks and a friendly atmosphere designed to help attendees learn from each other, meet interesting people, and generally have a stimulating experience.

KatieConf 2019. Header image by Nicolas Tissot. Sister conference of JessConf. Contact