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The choice of a variable name should be mnemonic — that is, designed to indicate to the casual observer the intent of its use. One-character variable names should be avoided except for temporary "throwaway" variables. Common names for temporary variables are i, j, k, m, and n for integers; c, d, and e for characters. int i;
The formatting of variable names may simplify some aspects of code refactoring (while making other aspects more error-prone). Multiple variables with similar semantics can be used in a block of code: dwWidth, iWidth, fWidth, dWidth. Variable names can be easy to remember from knowing just their types. It leads to more consistent variable names.
Strings are passed to functions by passing a pointer to the first code unit. Since char * and wchar_t * are different types, the functions that process wide strings are different than the ones processing normal strings and have different names. String literals ("text" in the C source code) are converted to arrays during compilation. [2]
If a variable is only referenced by a single identifier, that identifier can simply be called the name of the variable; otherwise, we can speak of it as one of the names of the variable. For instance, in the previous example the identifier "total_count" is the name of the variable in question, and "r" is another name of the same variable.
In programming languages, name binding is the association of entities (data and/or code) with identifiers. [1] An identifier bound to an object is said to reference that object. Machine languages have no built-in notion of identifiers, but name-object bindings as a service and notation for the programmer is implemented by programming languages.
Foobar was used as a variable name in the Fortran code of Colossal Cave Adventure (1977 Crowther and Woods version). The variable FOOBAR was used to contain the player's progress in saying the magic phrase "Fee Fie Foe Foo", a phrase from an historical quatrain in the classic English fairy tale Jack and the Beanstalk.
In the PHP language, which was largely inspired by Perl, "$" precedes any variable name. Names not prefixed by this are considered constants, functions or class names (or interface or trait names, which share the same namespace as classes). PILOT uses "$" for buffers (string variables), "#" for integer variables, and "*" for program labels.
In B, all variables must be declared, as one of auto, extrn, or implicitly as function arguments. [1] An external variable is defined outside functions, has a lifetime of the whole program execution, and introduced to function by the mean of extrn declaration. Using the following code in the tutorial as an example: [1]