Naming: Why should named constants be all uppercase in C++/Java?

Question

I know, that for C++ and Java it is a well established naming convention, that constants should be written all uppercase, with underscores to separate words. Like this (Java

Answer 1

I think it is not a technical problem but rather a psychological one. Naming conventions are not for the compiler to process (the computer does not really mind names) but rather for the programmer that is browsing the code to have as much information as possible with as little effort as required.

Using a different naming convention is clearly telling the reader that what you are reading is something that is FIXED at compile time and you don't need to follow through code to determine where and how the value got there.