Topic on Manual talk:Coding conventions

(ugh, Flow)

@Krenair, Nemo bis, Krinkle: Let's discuss. I see three things in the section under dispute:

• Messages
• Comments
• Documentation

There are other things that could be included but aren't explicitly listed:

• Names of classes, functions, methods, parameters, variables, constants, etc.
• Names of database tables, fields, etc.
• Message keys
• Non-localized exception and log texts

Messages shouldn't need dispute: Messages in en.json should use American English, since en-gb.json and en-ca.json exist for other varieties, while en-us.json doesn't because we use .

As for the rest, consistency in documentation (including doc-comments) within an area would make a better impression on those reading the documentation, and in thing-naming makes it slightly easier to remember the name of a thing if you're not using an IDE with auto-complete, but generally it's all going to be understandable by anyone who understands English and IMO doesn't need a major battle over it.

> Messages shouldn't need dispute: Messages in en.json should use American English, since en-gb.json and en-ca.json exist for other varieties, while en-us.json doesn't because we use .

I think this anachronism needs to change, but TWN has vetoed it sadly.

Nobody has actually told me any compelling reason to change how we do messages. I do not consider "language politics" as such to justify having to maintain both en-us and eb-gb separately from en. And I am against showing them an inconsistent/mixed version.

I suggested that we could actually call it American English in language selectors, but that idea didn't get much support on IRC.