Tag Archives: naming conventions

February 7, 2012, 11:00 am

How Do You Name Your Devices?

We’ve written about naming conventions before, as they afford real conveniences when keeping track of things like papers or syllabuses or . . . well, anything, really!

For example, rather than have a series of devices with the default manufacturer-supplied name (SEAGATE 1, 2, 3x; X’s iPod), you might name your devices after . . . characters on The Wire. You get the advantage of unique names for all your devices, added personalization, and a little hit of joy when you see them in an application window. The key, as Tom Scheinfeldt notes in the tweet linked below, is having a long enough source of names.

This came up on Twitter this morning, as some friends were discussing my GeekDad post about Dickens’s birthday Google Doodle (complete with a full-throated endorsement of the South Park adaptation of Great Expectations). It turns out that a fellow GeekDad writer, Michael Harrison, …

August 18, 2011, 4:11 pm

Naming Conventions: Good for Faculty and Students Alike

By Jason B. Jones

Naming conventions–the idea that related files are named in consistent ways–are clever time-savers, because they help ensure that the file name remains meaningful to you across time and through changes in context. Last year, I wrote that “every minute you spend teaching naming conventions at the start of the semester buys you up to ten minutes per student over the course of the semester.”

The difference between grading forty files named “paper1.doc” and those same forty files named “StudentName Course PaperTopic.rtf” really adds up over the course of the semester. (Of course, you have to be very specific in your instructions, else you will literally get files named “StudentName Course PaperTopic.rtf,” quotation marks and all!)

I was reminded of this–and of faculty members’ occasional penchant for complaining when students do things we ourselves do–this week when reading…