[webkit-dev] For your consideration: Naming scheme for fooIfExists/ensureFoo

[Ryosuke Niwa]

On Tue, Jun 18, 2013 at 6:38 PM, Darin Adler <darin at apple.com> wrote:

> Lets bike shed!
>
> For some time, functions with names like fooIfExists and ensureFoo have
> been bothering me. I find both names kind of opaque and unpleasant. Here’s
> an example:
>
>     StyleResolver* styleResolverIfExists();
>     StyleResolver* ensureStyleResolver()
>
> What do you think of these names instead?
>
>     StyleResolver* optionalStyleResolver();
>     StyleResolver& requiredStyleResolver();
>

requiredStyleResolver sounds as if it's a special (required) type of a
style resolver as opposed to the caller requiring it.  Why don't we call it
requireStyleResolver() instead?

Note also that I think the requiredStyleResolver function should return a
> reference so nobody is tempted to do null checks.


Sounds like a great idea.

On Tue, Jun 18, 2013 at 7:03 PM, Emil A Eklund <eae at chromium.org> wrote:

> On Tue, Jun 18, 2013 at 6:38 PM, Darin Adler <darin at apple.com> wrote:
> > What do you think of these names instead?
> >
> >     StyleResolver* optionalStyleResolver();
> >     StyleResolver& requiredStyleResolver();
>
> +1, much clearer and the pointer vs reference makes it even more so.
> Perhaps enough so that the required prefix could be dropped:
>
> StyleResolver* optionalStyleResolver();
> StyleResolver& styleResolver();


I think it's important to communicate the runtime cost of ensuring the
existence of the object.

- R. Niwa
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