Impacts of coding practices on readability

Abstract

Several conventions and standards aim to improve maintainability of software code. However, low levels of code readability perceived by developers still represent a barrier to their daily work. In this paper, we describe a survey that assessed the impact of a set of Java coding practices on the readability perceived by software developers. While some practices promoted an enhancement of readability, others did not show statistically significant effects. Interestingly, one of the practices worsened the readability. Our results may help to identify coding conventions with a positive impact on readability and, thus, guide the creation of coding standards.