Java Coding Standards in a Nutshell

The purpose of this book is to provide Java developers with standardized Java coding conventions to improve code readability, establish common standards in modules/projects while writing Java code. Common coding conventions enable readers and other programmers to understand code quickly and uniformly. It also promotes sustainability and maintainability. The recommendations are based on established standards collected from a number of sources, individual experience and local requirements/needs.

While a given development environment (IDE) can improve the readability of code by access visibility, color coding, automatic formatting and so on, the programmer should never rely on such features. Source code should always be considered larger than the IDE it is developed within and should be written in a way that maximizes its readability independent of any IDE.

Code conventions are important to programmers and readers for a number of reasons:
• 80% of the lifetime cost of a piece of software goes to maintenance.
• Hardly any software is maintained for its whole life by the original author.
• Code conventions improve the readability of the software, allowing engineers to understand new code more quickly and thoroughly.

Why waste time…let’s get to it!