Program style

Program style does not influence the running of a program.
Good style improves the readability and aids in the
understanding of program code.

Conventions and rules provide consistency between programs.

Naming conventions

   Named constant variables are in upper case letters.
   Class names start with an upper case letter.
   Other identifiers, method names start with a lower case letter.

Placement of braces, parenthesis and spaces

   Spaces 
   after commas,
   after semicolons in for statements,
   before and after operators, +, =, <=, etc.,
   before { and (,
   after } and ),
   (but not before and after the . operator.)
   * Remember that these are conventions and that they may vary
     from one programmer to another.  For example, ProgramLive and the 
     St George instructor do not include a space before the = operator
     and before and after ( and ).  The important point is that a
     programmer follows a good, readable style consistently.

   Braces 
   open brace at the end of a class, constructor or 
      method header statement,
   close brace aligned with the first letter of the header
      for the structure it closes.

Indentifiers
   Identifiers should be meaningful.
   Identifiers that are made up of more than one word
      start successive words with an upper case letter.

Restrict the use of magic constants.  Instead define
   a named constant and use the constants' name in the program.
   
Indenting
   When you start a new structure, eg. a loop, indent the
      body of the structure by 4 spaces.  When the
      structure is complete outdent by the same amount.
   If a statement extends over more than one line indent the 
      second and subsequent lines.  Once the statement is 
      complete return to the previous level of indenting.

Blank lines
   Use blank lines to indicate the structure of a program 
      or program fragment. 
   Leave a blank line after instance variables, between
      methods, before and after a loop or if.

Group declarations of variables with the same scope together.
 
Start each statement on a new line.

Develop programs in modular reusable parts.  Limit
   the dependency of parts of a program.  Encapsulate
   the parts making instance variables private and restrict
   access by the use of methods.  Use private helper methods
   to reduce the size of methods and 
   simplify the logic of your program.  

Comments
   Comments should not describe program implementation.  They 
   should describe what is done, the purpose, not how it is done.
   Comments should not just repeat the program code.
   Most program files include header comments that list the
   name of the programmer, date the program was written and
   programs' purpose.
   There is usually a class comment that precedes each class
   definition describing the purpose of the class.
   There is usually a method comment that precedes each method 
   describing the purpose of the method.
   Comments are also used to explain any tricky logic.