Difference between revisions of "Microsoft Access VBA Naming Conventions"

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[[Category:Conventions]]
 
[[Category:Conventions]]
 
== General ==
 
== General ==
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As novice developer you usually define names for constants, variables and methods as they occur;
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Please read the [http://wiki.vb24.net/index.php?title=Naming_Conventions vb24.net Article] about Naming Conventions.
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you look at a problem, think of a function, add some parameters and that's it.
 
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After a few years of coding—especially once you are forced to refactor some of your legacy
 
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coding—you will realize that the code is hard to read; it somehow feels "inconsistent".
 
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Also during normal development you will notice that you keep stumpling upon the same issues again
 
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and again: you're trying to access variables, which are not accessible, you try to use a variable
 
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for a text value and run in to an error as it has been defined for numbers: the list of little
 
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annoyances which are implied when not sticking to consistent conventions is long—add your
 
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favourite annoyance here.
 
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The naming conventions depend on the language you are using, but for VBA it is common conviction
 
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to use either the [http://www.xoc.net/standards/rvbanc.asp Reddick VBA Naming Conventions] or the
 
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[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Leszynski_naming_convention Leszynski VBA Naming Conventions], which
 
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are both versions of the [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hungarian_notation Hungarian notation].
 
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The main idea is to prefix everything with a tag which indicates the type of the variable.
 
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== Name ==
 
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All names will be in singular form. A table, for example, represents many uniformed records.
 
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Do we want to talk about many records or do we talk about the entity that table has been designed
 
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for? It is the entity.
 
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Let's look at it with a semantic focus: We have a table "Books" which has a field "ISBN".
 
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When we are talking about "Books.ISBN", do we mean all ISBNs of all Books? Or the ISBN of a
 
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certain Book? It is usually the latter. It also makes SQL statements and code much more readable
 
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besides the fact that mixing plural ("Books") and singular ("ISBN") does not make sense.
 
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Example:
 
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<syntaxhighlight lang="sql">
 
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    SELECT Book.Isbn
 
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      FROM Book
 
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INNER JOIN Order
 
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        ON Book.Isbn = Order.BookIsbn
 
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</syntaxhighlight>
 
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Another advantage of generally applying singular names is the option to denote collections
 
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and arrays with a plural form, which leads to easily understandable code like
 
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<syntaxhighlight lang="vb">
 
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For Each varBook In varBooks
 
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    varBook.Isbn = "unknown"
 
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Next varBook
 
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</syntaxhighlight>
 
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== Tag ==
 
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A tag is a usually three letter long lowercase mnemonic for the variable type. As there is not a
 
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tag for every kind of variable, you sometimes need to "invent" a tag of your own. The usual steps
 
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for finding an appropriate tag are:
 
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# Take the name of the object type
 
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# Remove all vowels from the name; you may keep the first vowel if necessary
 
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# Take the first three letters
 
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As soon as you found a tag you should consider the following questions too:
 
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* Is the tag already taken by another object type?
 
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* Does it phonetically sound like the object type?
 
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If you should answer one of these questions with "yes", you should adjust the tag name accordingly.
 
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=== Access Object ===
 
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{| class="wikitable"
 
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|+ align="bottom" | Tag: Access Object
 
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! style="text-align:left;" | Data Type !! style="text-align:left;" | Tag
 
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|-
 
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| Top Level Objects
 
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|-
 
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| Table || tbl
 
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|-
 
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| Query || qry
 
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|-
 
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| Form || frm
 
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|-
 
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| Sub Form || sfr
 
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|-
 
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| Report || rpt
 
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|-
 
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| Sub Report || srp
 
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|-
 
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| Module || mod
 
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|-
 
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| Class || cls
 
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|-
 
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| Related Objects
 
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|-
 
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| Field || fld
 
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|-
 
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| Control || ctl
 
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|-
 
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| Label || lbl
 
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|-
 
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| Text Box || txt
 
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|-
 
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| Combo Box || cmb
 
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|-
 
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| List Box || lst
 
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|-
 
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| Check Box || chk
 
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|-
 
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| Button || btn
 
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|-
 
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| Option Group || grp
 
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|-
 
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| Option Button || opt
 
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|-
 
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| Tab Control || tab
 
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|-
 
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| Tab Control Page || tpg
 
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|-
 
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| Frame || fra
 
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|-
 
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| Frame bound || frb
 
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|-
 
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| Frame unbound || fru
 
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|-
 
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| Image || img
 
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|-
 
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| Line || lin
 
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|-
 
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| Page Break || brk
 
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|}
 
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* cmb vs cbo
 
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* btn vs cmd
 
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* tpg vs pge
 
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* tgl vs btn
 
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=== Data Type ===
 
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{| class="wikitable"
 
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|+ align="bottom" | Tag: Data Type
 
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! style="text-align:left;" | Data Type !! style="text-align:left;" | Tag
 
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|-
 
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| Boolean || bln
 
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|-
 
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| Integer || int
 
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|-
 
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| Long || lng
 
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|-
 
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| Single || sng
 
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|-
 
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| Double || dbl
 
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|-
 
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| Currency || cur
 
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|-
 
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| String || str
 
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|-
 
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| Date || dat
 
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|-
 
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| Variant || var
 
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|-
 
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| Array || arr, var
 
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|-
 
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| Type || typ
 
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|-
 
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| Object || obj
 
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|}
 

Latest revision as of 16:26, 7 April 2011

General

Please read the vb24.net Article about Naming Conventions.

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