Technotes, HowTo Series

C♯ Coding Style Guide

Version 0.4
by Mike Krüger, [email protected]

Contents
1 About the C♯ Coding Style Guide1
2 File Organization 1
3 Indentation 2
4 Comments 3
5 Declarations 4
6 Statements 5
7 White Space 7
8 Naming Conventions 9
9 Programming Practices 11
10 Code Examples 12

1 About the C♯ Coding Style Guide

This document may be read as a guide to writing robust and reliable programs. It focuses on
programs written in C♯, but many of the rules and principles are useful even if you write in
another programming language.

2 File Organization
2.1 C♯ Sourcefiles
Keep your classes/files short, don't exceed 2000 LOC, divide your code up, make structures
clearer. Put every class in a separate file and name the file like the class name (with .cs as
extension of course). This convention makes things much easier.

2.2 Directory Layout

Create a directory for every namespace. (For MyProject.TestSuite.TestTier
use MyProject/TestSuite/TestTier as the path, do not use the namespace name
with dots.) This makes it easier to map namespaces to the directory layout.
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3 Indentation
3.1 Wrapping Lines
When an expression will not fit on a single line, break it up according to these general
principles:

Break after a comma.

Break after an operator.
Prefer higher-level breaks to lower-level breaks.
Align the new line with the beginning of the expression at the same level on
the previous line

Example of breaking up method calls:

longMethodCall(expr1, expr2,
expr3, expr4, expr5);

Examples of breaking an arithmetic expression:

PREFER:
var = a * b / (c - g + f) +
4 * z;

BAD STYLE – AVOID:

var = a * b / (c - g +
f) + 4 * z;

The first is preferred, since the break occurs outside the paranthesized expression (higher
level rule). Note that you indent with tabs to the indentation level and then with spaces to the
breaking position in our example this would be:
> var = a * b / (c - g + f) +
> ......4 * z;

Where '>' are tab chars and '.' are spaces. (the spaces after the tab char are the indent with of
the tab). A good coding practice is to make the tab and space chars visible in the editor which
is used.

3.2 White Spaces

An indentation standard using spaces never was achieved. Some people like 2 spaces, some
prefer 4 and others die for 8, or even more spaces. Better use tabs. Tab characters have some
advantages:

Everyone can set their own preferred indentation level

It is only 1 character and not 2, 4, 8 … therefore it will reduce typing (even
with smart indenting you have to set the indentation manually sometimes, or
take it back or whatever)
If you want to increase the indentation (or decrease), mark one block and
increase the indent level with Tab with Shift-Tab you decrease the
indentation. This is true for almost any text editor.

Here, we define the Tab as the standard indentation character.

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 Don't use spaces for indentation - use tabs!

4 Comments
4.1 Block Comments
Block comments should usually be avoided. For descriptions use of the /// comments to give
C♯ standard descriptions is recommended. When you wish to use block comments you
should use the following style :

/* Line 1
* Line 2
* Line 3
*/

As this will set off the block visually from code for the (human) reader. Alternatively you
might use this old fashioned C style for single line comments, even though it is not
recommended. In case you use this style, a line break should follow the comment, as it is
hard to see code proceeded by comments in the same line:

/* blah blah blah */

Block comments may be useful in rare cases, refer to the TechNote 'The fine Art of
Commenting' for an example. Generally block comments are useful for comment out
large sections of code.

4.2 Single Line Comments

You should use the // comment style to "comment out" code (SharpDevelop has a key for it,
Alt+/) . It may be used for commenting sections of code too.
Single line comments must be indented to the indent level when they are used for code
documentation. Commented out code should be commented out in the first line to enhance
the visibility of commented out code.
A rule of thumb says that generally, the length of a comment should not exceed the length of
the code explained by too much, as this is an indication of too complicated, potentially
buggy, code.

4.3 Documentation Comments

In the .net framework, Microsoft has introduced a documentation generation system based on
XML comments. These comments are formally single line C♯ comments containing XML
tags. They follow this pattern for single line comments:

/// <summary>
/// This class...
/// </summary>

Multiline XML comments follow this pattern:

/// <exception cref=”BogusException”>

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 /// This exception gets thrown as soon as a
/// Bogus flag gets set.
/// </exception>

All lines must be preceded by three slashes to be accepted as XML comment lines.
Tags fall into two categories:

Documentation items
Formatting/Referencing

The first category contains tags like <summary>, <param> or <exception>. These
represent items that represent the elements of a program's API which must be documented for
the program to be useful to other programmers. These tags usually have attributes such as
name or cref as demonstrated in the multi line example above. These attributes are
checked by the compiler, so they should be valid.
The latter category governs the layout of the documentation, using tags such as <code>,
<list> or <para>.
Documentation can then be generated using the 'documentation' item in the ♯develop 'build'
menu. The documentation generated is in HTMLHelp format.
For a fuller explanation of XML comments see the Microsoft .net framework SDK
documentation. For information on commenting best practice and further issues related to
commenting, see the TechNote 'The fine Art of Commenting'.

5 Declarations
5.1 Number of Declarations per Line
One declaration per line is recommended since it encourages commenting. In other words,

int level; // indentation level

int size; // size of table

Do not put more than one variable or variables of different types on the same line when
declaring them. Example:

int a, b; //What is 'a'? What does 'b' stand for?

The above example also demonstrates the drawbacks of non-obvious variable names. Be
clear when naming variables.

5.2 Initialization
Try to initialize local variables as soon as they are declared. For example:

string name = myObject.Name;

or
int val = time.Hours;

Note: If you initialize a dialog try to use the using statement:

using (OpenFileDialog openFileDialog = new OpenFileDialog())

{
...
}

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5.3 Class, Interface and Namespace Declarations
When coding C♯ classes, interfaces and namespaces , the following formatting rules should
be followed:

The opening brace "{" appears in the next line after the declaration
statement.
The closing brace "}" starts a line by itself indented to match its
corresponding opening brace.

For example:

class MySample : MyClass, IMyInterface

{
int myInt;

namespace MyNamespace
{
// namespace contents
}

For a brace placement example look at section 10.1.

5.4 Method Declarations

For method declarations the class bracket placement rules should be applied and you
should use no space between a method name and the parenthesis "(" starting its
parameter list.

For example:

public MySample(int myInt)

{
this.myInt = myInt ;
}

void Inc()
{

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 ++myInt;
}

5.4 Property, Indexer and Event Declarations

For properties, indexers and events you should NOT put any brace at it's own line expect
the final closing brace "}".

For example:

public int Amount {

get {
...
}
set {
...
}
}

public this[string index] {

get;
set;
}

public EventHandler MyEvent {

add {
...
}
remove {
...
}
}

6.1 Simple Statements

Each line should contain only one statement.

6.2 Return Statements

A return statement should not use outer most parentheses.
Don't use : return (n * (n + 1) / 2);
use : return n * (n + 1) / 2;

6.3 If, if-else, if else-if else Statements

if, if-else and if else-if else statements should look like this:

if (condition) {
DoSomething();
...
}

if (condition) {
DoSomething();
...
} else {
DoSomethingOther();
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 ...
}

if (condition) {
DoSomething();
...
} else if (condition) {
DoSomethingOther();
...
} else {
DoSomethingOtherAgain();
...
}

6.4 For / Foreach Statements

A for statement should have following form :

for (int i = 0; i < 5; ++i) {

...
}

or single lined (consider using a while statement instead) :

for (initialization; condition; update) ;

A foreach should look like :

foreach (int i in IntList) {

...
}

Note: Generally use brackets even if there is only one statement in the loop.

6.5 While/do-while Statements

A while statement should be written as follows:

while (condition) {
...
}

An empty while should have the following form:

while (condition) ;

A do-while statement should have the following form:

do {
...
} while (condition);

6.6 Switch Statements

A switch statement should be of following form:

switch (condition) {
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 case A:
...
break;
case B:
...
break;
default:
...
break;
}

6.7 Try-catch Statements

A try-catch statement should follow this form:

try {
...
} catch (Exception) {}

or
try {
...
} catch (Exception e) {
...
}

or

try {
...
} catch (Exception e) {
...
} finally {
...
}

7 White Space
7.1 Blank Lines
Blank lines improve readability. They set off blocks of code which are in themselves
logically related.
Two blank lines should always be used between:

Logical sections of a source file

Class and interface definitions (try one class/interface per file to prevent this case)

One blank line should always be used between:

Methods
Properties
Local variables in a method and its first statement
Logical sections inside a method to improve readability

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Note that you should always indent blank lines to the correct indent level instead of leaving
them blank or more worse using another indentation level. This insertion of new statements
in these lines much easier.

7.2 Inter-term spacing

There should be a single space after a comma or a semicolon, for example:

TestMethod(a, b, c); don't use : TestMethod(a,b,c)

or
TestMethod( a, b, c );

Single spaces surround operators (except unary operators like increment or logical not),
example:

a = b; // don't use a=b;

for (int i = 0; i < 10; ++i) // don't use for (int i=0; i
<10; ++i)
// or
// for(int i=0;i<10;++i)

7.3 Table like formatting

A logical block of lines should be formatted as a table:

string name = "Mr. Ed";

int myValue = 5;
Test aTest = Test.TestYou;

Use spaces for the table like formatting and not tabs because the table formatting may look
strange in special tab intent levels.

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8 Naming Conventions
8.1 Capitalization Styles
8.1.1 Pascal Casing
This convention capitalizes the first character of each word (as in TestCounter).

8.1.2 Camel Casing

This convention capitalizes the first character of each word except the first one. E.g.
testCounter.

8.1.3 Upper case

Only use all upper case for identifiers if it consists of an abbreviation which is one or two
characters long, identifiers of three or more characters should use Pascal Casing instead. For
Example:

public class Math

{
public const PI = ...
public const E = ...
public const feigenBaumNumber = ...
}

8.2. Naming Guidelines

Generally the use of underscore characters inside names and naming according to the
guidelines for Hungarian notation are considered bad practice.
Hungarian notation is a defined set of pre and postfixes which are applied to names to reflect
the type of the variable. This style of naming was widely used in early Windows
programming, but now is obsolete or at least should be considered deprecated. Using
Hungarian notation is not allowed if you follow this guide.
And remember: a good variable name describes the semantic not the type.
An exception to this rule is GUI code. All fields and variable names that contain GUI
elements like button should be postfixed with their type name without abbreviations. For
example:

System.Windows.Forms.Button cancelButton;
System.Windows.Forms.TextBox nameTextBox;

8.2.1 Class Naming Guidelines

Class names must be nouns or noun phrases.
UsePascal Casing see 8.1.1
Do not use any class prefix

8.2.2 Interface Naming Guidelines

Name interfaces with nouns or noun phrases or adjectives describing behavior. (Example
IComponent or IEnumberable)
Use Pascal Casing (see 8.1.1)
Use I as prefix for the name, it is followed by a capital letter (first char of the interface
name)

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8.2.3 Enum Naming Guidelines
Use Pascal Casing for enum value names and enum type names
Don’t prefix (or suffix) a enum type or enum values
Use singular names for enums
Use plural name for bit fields.

8.2.4 ReadOnly and Const Field Names

Name static fields with nouns, noun phrases or abbreviations for nouns
Use Pascal Casing (see 8.1.1)

8.2.5 Parameter/non const field Names

Do use descriptive names, which should be enough to determine the variable meaning and
it’s type. But prefer a name that’s based on the parameter’s meaning.
Use Camel Casing (see 8.1.2)

8.2.6 Variable Names

Counting variables are preferably called i, j, k, l, m, n when used in 'trivial'
counting loops. (see 10.2 for an example on more intelligent naming for global counters
etc.)
Prefer using prefixes for boolean variables like Is, Has or Can. Generally you
should give boolean variables names that imply true or false (for example:
fileFound, done, success or with is prefixes: isFileFound, isDone,
isSuccess but don't try IsName that doesn't make sense at all).
Use Camel Casing (see 8.1.2)

8.2.7 Method Names

Name methods with verbs or verb phrases.
Use Pascal Casing (see 8.1.2)

8.2.8 Property Names

Name properties using nouns or noun phrases
Use Pascal Casing (see 8.1.2)
Consider naming a property with the same name as it’s type

8.2.9 Event Names

Name event handlers with the EventHandler suffix.
Use two parameters named sender and e
Use Pascal Casing (see 8.1.1)
Name event argument classes with the EventArgs suffix.
Name event names that have a concept of pre and post using the present and past tense.
Consider naming events using a verb.

8.2.10 Capitalization summary

Type Case Notes
Class / Struct Pascal Casing
Interface Pascal Casing Starts with I
Enum values Pascal Casing
Enum type Pascal Casing
Events Pascal Casing
Exception class Pascal Casing End with Exception

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public Fields Pascal Casing
Methods Pascal Casing
Namespace Pascal Casing
Property Pascal Casing
Protected/private Fields Camel Casing
Parameters Camel Casing

9 Programming Practices
9.1 Visibility
Do not make any instance or class variable public, make them private. Try to avoid the
“private” keyword this is the standard modifier and all C# programmers should know
that therefore just write nothing.
Use properties for class variables instead. You may use public static fields (or
const) as an exception to this rule, but be careful with it.

9.2 No 'magic' Numbers

Don’t use magic numbers, i.e. place constant numerical values directly into the source code.
Replacing these later on in case of changes (say, your application can now handle 3540 users
instead of the 427 hardcoded into your code in 50 lines scattered troughout your 25000 LOC)
is error-prone and unproductive. Instead declare a const variable which contains the
number :

public class MyMath

{
public const double PI = 3.14159...
}

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10 Code Examples
10.1 Brace placement example
namespace ShowMeTheBracket
{
public enum Test {
TestMe,
TestYou
}

public class TestMeClass

{
Test test;

public Test Test {

get {
return test;
}
set {
test = value;
}
}

void DoSomething()
{
if (test == Test.TestMe) {
//...stuff gets done
} else {
//...other stuff gets done
}
}
}
}

Brackets should begin on a new line only after:

Namespace declarations (note that this is new in version 0.3 and was different in 0.2)
Class/Interface/Struct declarations
Method declarations

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10.2 Variable naming example
instead of :

for (int i = 1; i < num; ++i) {

meetsCriteria[i] = true;
}
for (int i = 2; i < num / 2; ++i) {
int j = i + i;
while (j <= num) {
meetsCriteria[j] = false;
j += i;
}
}
for (int i = 0; i < num; ++i) {
if (meetsCriteria[i]) {
Console.WriteLine(i + " meets criteria");
}
}

try intelligent naming :

for (int primeCandidate = 1; primeCandidate < num;

++primeCandidate) {
isPrime[primeCandidate] = true;
}

for (int factor = 2; factor < num / 2; ++factor) {

int factorableNumber = factor + factor;
while (factorableNumber <= num) {
isPrime[factorableNumber] = false;
factorableNumber += factor;
}
}

for (int primeCandidate = 0; primeCandidate < num;

++primeCandidate) {
if (isPrime[primeCandidate]) {
Console.WriteLine(primeCandidate + " is prime.");
}
}

Note: Indexer variables generally should be called

i, j, k etc. But in cases like this, it may make sense to reconsider this rule.
In general, when the same counters or indexers are reused, give them
meaningful names.

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