6

Naming Guidelines

Rushabh Mehta edited this page 2023-12-21 15:02:17 +05:30

Table of Contents

• General Guidelines
• DocType naming
• Field Naming
• Variable Naming

Naming something is probably the most important decisions that you need to take as a user. Here are some guidelines will selecting names

"To change this rock into a jewel, you must change its true name. And to do that, my son, even to so small a scrap of the world, is to change the world" - Wizard of Earthsea

General Guidelines

1. Naming should be something that is used in common language. There are legacy ERP systems that have a specific naming style, we should constantly keep away from those styles, going with a more simple naming style. Shopify is a great example of how to name things. For example, in legacy ERP systems, a Purchase Receipt is called as "Goods Receipt Note".
2. Names should represent the essence of the concepts they represent and avoid accounting/management jargon.
3. Names should be consistent with the rest of the system.
4. No abbreviations. Use complete names as far as possible in both object and variable naming.

DocType naming

DocType names must be:

1. Title Case
2. Singular
3. Names with multiple words should be separated by a space. Example "Sales Invoice"
4. US English
5. Child table names should be parent table names + the relation, for example, "Sales Order Item"

Field Naming

1. Labels must be sentence case (except links)
2. Link names must be same as the DocType they refer to (for example Link to "Employee" should be employee)
3. Table field names must be plural and just be the relation, for example, field name for "Sales Order Item" should be items
4. Field name must be the slugged version of the label ("First Name" must be first_name)
5. Avoid descriptions. Labels must be as clear as possible.
6. Use full names (not abbreviations)

Variable Naming

1. Variables representing Document objects must be slugged versions of the DocType [example: sales_order = frappe.get_doc('Sales Order', 'SO-0001')]
2. Variables representing names, should be suffixed with _name [example: sales_order_name]
3. Child table in a loop can be d [example: for d in sales_order.items]
4. Avoid using numbered variables, like i1, i2 etc. Use descriptive variables.

Note: Title Case means to capitalize every word except articles (a, an, the), coordinating conjunctions (and, or, but), and (short) prepositions (in, on, for, up, etc.).