Java Programming Style

• every class should be in a separate file;
• use meaningful names for the variables and for the file names;
• use comments;
  • comments should explain what a piece of code intends to do; in particular, every method -- even a simple one -- should, as a minimum, have comments explaining what exactly it does, and what is the meaning of all its parameters
  • comments should not duplicate the text of the program; for example, "initialize the variables" is a good comment, but a comment "assign the value 0 to the variable x" after a line x = 0; does not add any additional meaning to the code;
• always use {} for blocks corresponding to "if", "while", and "for" statements, even if the corresponding block consists of only one statement;
• use indentation;
  • every time you have a method within a class, a group of statements within an if-else construction or a loop -- anything with {} -- indent this group of statements;
  • do not indent too much, since then you will run out of space; Java recommends 4 spaces; our textbook often uses 3; 2 spaces is also OK;
  • try not to use Tab because Tab may look different on different screens and different editors -- especially if you sometimes use Tab and sometimes, simply add a few blank spaces;
• avoid long lines since they're not handled well by many terminals.