by Mark Zhou
25. October 2010 20:53
Naming convention provides a common look for the libraries that target to the Common Language Runtime (CLR), by convention, only a few types that extend certain base types or implement base interfaces can have suffix. For example, any types that extend System.Attribute, or System.Exception should have “Attribute” or “Exception” suffix.
Oppositely, other types, or identifiers, should not have suffix if they are not listed in this article. Furthermore, the below table shows a list of reserved suffixes, which are associated with their base types or interfaces.
| Suffix | Base types/interfaces |
| Attribute | System.Attribute |
| Collection | System.Collections.ICollection
System.Collections.Generic.ICollection<T>
System.Collections.IEnumerable
System.Collections.Generic.IEnumerable<T>
System.Collections.Queue
System.Collections.Generic.Queue<T>
System.Collections.Stack
System.Collections.Generic.Stack<T>
System.Data.DataTable
System.Data.DataSet |
| Dictionary | System.Collections.IDictionary
System.Collections.Generic.IDictionary<TKey, TValue> |
| EventArgs | System.EventArgs |
| EventHandler | Event handler delegates |
| Exception | System.Exception |
| Permission | System.Security.IPermission |
| Queue | System.Collections.Queue
System.Collections.Quque<T> |
| Stack | System.Collections.Stack
System.Collections.Generic.Stack<T> |
| Stream | System.IO.Stream |
In addition, the following rules also apply:
- Do not suffix delegates with “Delegate”. suffix its type name is redundant.
- Do not suffix enums with “Enum”, suffix its type name is redundant.
- If member of a type implements an interface, or the member overrides an abstract member, or a type implements an external interface (that is, a COM visible interface or interface defined in other assembly), do not suffix it with “Impl” (many C++ transferred developers usually do this which is not compliant with this rule), use “Core” instead. e.g. CanCompareBitCore.
- If you have different versions of types defined in your libraries, do not distinguish the earlier and newer versions by adding “Ex” or similar suffix (many C++ migrated developers usually do this, which is causing a violation of this rule). Alternatively, use a sequential number such as “2”, “3” as its suffix. e.g. System.ServiceModel.Activation namespace defines WebServiceHostFactory type, then in a WCF REST extension library, a WebServiceHostFactory2 type may be defined to extend the existing features of WebServiceHostFactory; another example is the IAutoComplete2 interface of the Windows API.
Do not suppress this rule in any case.
To get more information about this rule, please see the MSDN link for CA1711 for details.
Subscribe