C# coding style: comments

Question

Most C# style guides recommend against the /* ... */ commenting style, in favor of // or ///. Why is the former style to be avoided?

Answer 1

There are a few reasons to prefer // to /*.. */.

• As JaredPar mentioned, there are weird comment-nesting issues that can crop up with /* */ usage.
• If you ever write/wrote some code that processes source code files, you'll be really happy if the // method is all that you have to deal with.
• It is far easier to visually detect a large block of commented code with the "//" method, particularly if syntax coloring is unavailable. In fact, you'll often see the individual lines in a /* */ block prefixed with a *, just to be safe.
• The XML commenting style that can be used to produce code documentation requires "///" to be used.