Best practices question: Do you use the this keyword when using instance members in a method?
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[EDIT]Code given below is in C#, but the question holds for C++ and Java too, with suitable modifications.[/EDIT]
class Car
{
private int speed;
// ...
}If you have a class Car with an instance member speed, how do you refer to it in Car's methods?
public void SpeedUp(int delta)
{
speed += delta;
}or
public void SpeedUp(int delta)
{
this.speed += delta;
}I used to practise the former style and used the this keyword only to resolve name clashes, but am now converted to the latter style. Sure, there's Intellisense, but when I'm poring over thousands of lines of code, I don't want to move my mouse to the variable in question and hover it there. Cheers, Vikram.
"When I read in books about a "base class", I figured this was the class that was at the bottom of the inheritence tree. It's the "base", right? Like the base of a pyramid." - Marc Clifton. i dont mind to be a stupid,better than being a moron - Adnan Siddiqi. -- modified at 10:17 Tuesday 24th January, 2006
Since no one gave my own personal answer on this: I use this in c# when I don't feel like typing out the whole variable name. So if you look in my code you will find it randomly about 30% of the time. It's a bit of a non-issue really. If intellisense didn't require it (and it sounds like it might not in vs 2k5) I wouldn't use it at all, why type more than necessary.
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Since no one gave my own personal answer on this: I use this in c# when I don't feel like typing out the whole variable name. So if you look in my code you will find it randomly about 30% of the time. It's a bit of a non-issue really. If intellisense didn't require it (and it sounds like it might not in vs 2k5) I wouldn't use it at all, why type more than necessary.
Same here. A few months ago I discovered the CTRL+J trick, which has cut down on my 'this' usage more yet.
Tech, life, family, faith: Give me a visit. I'm currently blogging about: Connor's Christmas Spectacular! Judah Himango
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Same here. A few months ago I discovered the CTRL+J trick, which has cut down on my 'this' usage more yet.
Tech, life, family, faith: Give me a visit. I'm currently blogging about: Connor's Christmas Spectacular! Judah Himango
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An unqualified denial, eh? :) Cheers, Vikram.
"When I read in books about a "base class", I figured this was the class that was at the bottom of the inheritence tree. It's the "base", right? Like the base of a pyramid." - Marc Clifton. i dont mind to be a stupid,better than being a moron - Adnan Siddiqi.
Vikram A Punathambekar wrote:
An unqualified denial, eh?
YES!!! ;P It's too much clutter. The only reason I see programmers do this is for Intellisense. Geez, these kids nowadays. (Besides, with VS2005, Intellisense kicks in as you start typing). Actually, the only time I use "this." is if I have a parameter with the same name as the field, and the ONLY time I do that is in a constructor, when the parameters in the constructor are initializing fields. Elsewhere, I use more descriptive names if there's going to be a collision, both in parameters and in local variables. Marc Pensieve
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[EDIT]Code given below is in C#, but the question holds for C++ and Java too, with suitable modifications.[/EDIT]
class Car
{
private int speed;
// ...
}If you have a class Car with an instance member speed, how do you refer to it in Car's methods?
public void SpeedUp(int delta)
{
speed += delta;
}or
public void SpeedUp(int delta)
{
this.speed += delta;
}I used to practise the former style and used the this keyword only to resolve name clashes, but am now converted to the latter style. Sure, there's Intellisense, but when I'm poring over thousands of lines of code, I don't want to move my mouse to the variable in question and hover it there. Cheers, Vikram.
"When I read in books about a "base class", I figured this was the class that was at the bottom of the inheritence tree. It's the "base", right? Like the base of a pyramid." - Marc Clifton. i dont mind to be a stupid,better than being a moron - Adnan Siddiqi. -- modified at 10:17 Tuesday 24th January, 2006
I use the
thiskeyword. ColinMackay.net "Man who stand on hill with mouth open will wait long time for roast duck to drop in." -- Confucius "If a man empties his purse into his head, no man can take it away from him, for an investment in knowledge pays the best interest." -- Joseph E. O'Donnell -
I used this just to diferenciate between members variables and the rest of them, ...until someone told me about the hungarian notation :rolleyes:
Gizzo wrote:
I used this just to diferenciate between members variables and the rest of them, ...until someone told me about the hungarian notation
:omg: You still use that! :-D ColinMackay.net "Man who stand on hill with mouth open will wait long time for roast duck to drop in." -- Confucius "If a man empties his purse into his head, no man can take it away from him, for an investment in knowledge pays the best interest." -- Joseph E. O'Donnell
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Gizzo wrote:
I used this just to diferenciate between members variables and the rest of them, ...until someone told me about the hungarian notation
:omg: You still use that! :-D ColinMackay.net "Man who stand on hill with mouth open will wait long time for roast duck to drop in." -- Confucius "If a man empties his purse into his head, no man can take it away from him, for an investment in knowledge pays the best interest." -- Joseph E. O'Donnell
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I use the
thiskeyword. ColinMackay.net "Man who stand on hill with mouth open will wait long time for roast duck to drop in." -- Confucius "If a man empties his purse into his head, no man can take it away from him, for an investment in knowledge pays the best interest." -- Joseph E. O'DonnellColin Angus Mackay wrote:
I use the this keyword.
so do i !!! :doh:
TOXCCT >>> GEII power
[toxcct][VisualCalc 2.20][VCalc 3.0 soon...] -
[EDIT]Code given below is in C#, but the question holds for C++ and Java too, with suitable modifications.[/EDIT]
class Car
{
private int speed;
// ...
}If you have a class Car with an instance member speed, how do you refer to it in Car's methods?
public void SpeedUp(int delta)
{
speed += delta;
}or
public void SpeedUp(int delta)
{
this.speed += delta;
}I used to practise the former style and used the this keyword only to resolve name clashes, but am now converted to the latter style. Sure, there's Intellisense, but when I'm poring over thousands of lines of code, I don't want to move my mouse to the variable in question and hover it there. Cheers, Vikram.
"When I read in books about a "base class", I figured this was the class that was at the bottom of the inheritence tree. It's the "base", right? Like the base of a pyramid." - Marc Clifton. i dont mind to be a stupid,better than being a moron - Adnan Siddiqi. -- modified at 10:17 Tuesday 24th January, 2006
I'm lazy and haven't read the thread, but using "this." is just silly. Use "m_" and be done with it. ;) And before you gripe about Hungarian, think twice. How is "this." any different from a Hungarian prefix? You've just replaced a 2-character prefix with a 5-character prefix. --Mike-- Visual C++ MVP :cool: LINKS~! Ericahist | NEW!! PimpFish | CP SearchBar v3.0 | C++ Forum FAQ Laugh it up, fuzzball.
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[EDIT]Code given below is in C#, but the question holds for C++ and Java too, with suitable modifications.[/EDIT]
class Car
{
private int speed;
// ...
}If you have a class Car with an instance member speed, how do you refer to it in Car's methods?
public void SpeedUp(int delta)
{
speed += delta;
}or
public void SpeedUp(int delta)
{
this.speed += delta;
}I used to practise the former style and used the this keyword only to resolve name clashes, but am now converted to the latter style. Sure, there's Intellisense, but when I'm poring over thousands of lines of code, I don't want to move my mouse to the variable in question and hover it there. Cheers, Vikram.
"When I read in books about a "base class", I figured this was the class that was at the bottom of the inheritence tree. It's the "base", right? Like the base of a pyramid." - Marc Clifton. i dont mind to be a stupid,better than being a moron - Adnan Siddiqi. -- modified at 10:17 Tuesday 24th January, 2006
I had the bad habit of using a this prefix in my C# code, just for the intellisense. Now, I try and avoid it as it leads to sloppy coding. Michael CP Blog [^] Development Blog [^]
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Colin Angus Mackay wrote:
You still use that!
what? the hungarian notation or this keyword? I use the hungarian notation. What's wrong with it? We have to use one, anyway.
Gizzo wrote:
What's wrong with it?
it's not cool any more. the smart people have decreed that we all need to use a different kind of notation now. Cleek | Image Toolkits | Thumbnail maker
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Colin Angus Mackay wrote:
You still use that!
what? the hungarian notation or this keyword? I use the hungarian notation. What's wrong with it? We have to use one, anyway.
Gizzo wrote:
What's wrong with it?
It spent too long as a fad, which means lots of people think they know how to use it while in reality having no clue, most of them not even grasping the problem it was intended to solve. Sorta like "object-oriented programming"...
---- Scripts i've known... CPhog 0.9.9 - make CP better. Forum Bookmark 0.2.1 - bookmark forum posts on Pensieve Print forum 0.1.2 - printer-friendly forums
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I'm lazy and haven't read the thread, but using "this." is just silly. Use "m_" and be done with it. ;) And before you gripe about Hungarian, think twice. How is "this." any different from a Hungarian prefix? You've just replaced a 2-character prefix with a 5-character prefix. --Mike-- Visual C++ MVP :cool: LINKS~! Ericahist | NEW!! PimpFish | CP SearchBar v3.0 | C++ Forum FAQ Laugh it up, fuzzball.
Either way gets the job done, so long as everyone understands *why* it's being done and does it the same way. I still shudder every time i see someone prefixing a local variable with
m_in a sad attempt to get copy-paste code working... :sigh:---- Scripts i've known... CPhog 0.9.9 - make CP better. Forum Bookmark 0.2.1 - bookmark forum posts on Pensieve Print forum 0.1.2 - printer-friendly forums
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Gizzo wrote:
What's wrong with it?
it's not cool any more. the smart people have decreed that we all need to use a different kind of notation now. Cleek | Image Toolkits | Thumbnail maker
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Gizzo wrote:
What's wrong with it?
It spent too long as a fad, which means lots of people think they know how to use it while in reality having no clue, most of them not even grasping the problem it was intended to solve. Sorta like "object-oriented programming"...
---- Scripts i've known... CPhog 0.9.9 - make CP better. Forum Bookmark 0.2.1 - bookmark forum posts on Pensieve Print forum 0.1.2 - printer-friendly forums
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Colin Angus Mackay wrote:
You still use that!
what? the hungarian notation or this keyword? I use the hungarian notation. What's wrong with it? We have to use one, anyway.
Its crap. The hungarian notatin is a pile of shit that make windows documentation a joke. eg from MSDN: LRESULT CALLBACK WindowProc( HWND hwnd, // handle to window WM_COMMAND, // the message to send WPARAM wParam, // notification code and identifier LPARAM lParam // handle to control (HWND) ); why? it is 32 bit. Why not dwParam. etc etc etc. Hungarian notation is an unmaintainable pile of crap. Nunc est bibendum
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Its crap. The hungarian notatin is a pile of shit that make windows documentation a joke. eg from MSDN: LRESULT CALLBACK WindowProc( HWND hwnd, // handle to window WM_COMMAND, // the message to send WPARAM wParam, // notification code and identifier LPARAM lParam // handle to control (HWND) ); why? it is 32 bit. Why not dwParam. etc etc etc. Hungarian notation is an unmaintainable pile of crap. Nunc est bibendum
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But do you agree with me that is necesary to use some kind of notation? Overall if you are working in a team. When I have to revise some old code I feel lost trying to guest the types and everything...Imagine you wouldn't have Intellisense...
No, I dont. My notation differentiates between pointers, non pointers, and between global, local and member variables. p for pointer, g for global, m for member and that is it. Any distinction between data types is in the naming, so, for example, I might use NumberOfBytesWritten++; If it aint big enough I will make it unsigned, 32 but, etc. If I am using a string or an array, I will like wies use a meaningful name. BTW, if variable names are full descriptive names (and the same for functions too) then code commenting is less important. And I have had my code maintained very effectively by other coder who find it very easy to follow and read. Nunc est bibendum
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No, I dont. My notation differentiates between pointers, non pointers, and between global, local and member variables. p for pointer, g for global, m for member and that is it. Any distinction between data types is in the naming, so, for example, I might use NumberOfBytesWritten++; If it aint big enough I will make it unsigned, 32 but, etc. If I am using a string or an array, I will like wies use a meaningful name. BTW, if variable names are full descriptive names (and the same for functions too) then code commenting is less important. And I have had my code maintained very effectively by other coder who find it very easy to follow and read. Nunc est bibendum
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fat_boy wrote:
My notation differentiates between pointers, non pointers, and between global, local and member variables.p for pointer, g for global, m for member and that is it.
:doh: That's a notation itself. And it's derived from hungarian... I think.