"Gerardo Richarte" gera@corest.com asks:

The device I'm working on, as well as other devices, have bits which can be set, cleared and tested. For this we need three different methods (could be two). The question is on how to name them:

opt. 1: isOwnedByHost (test) beOwnedByHost (set) beOwnedByCard (clear)

opt. 2: ownedByHost (test) etc.

opt. 3: isEndOfPacket (test) beEndOfPacket (set) dontBeEndOfPacket (clear)

opt. 4: isEndOfPacket (test) endOfPacketSet endOfPacketClear

or any mix, or anything else. Right now I have a mixture, like opt1

and opt4. I'm not sure if this is the best thing to do (mix the flavors) or stick to a more strict naming convention and leave the English semantic aside. Remember English is not my native tongue, so I may as well misjudge what's sounds better.

 Uses of this would be, for example

receiveRing isOwnedByHost ifTrue: [queue add: (EthernetPacket bytes:

receiveRing message)]

transmitRing beEndOfPacket.
transmitRing dontBeEndOfPacket

or

transmitRing endOfPacketSet
transmitRing endOfPacketClear

thoughts?
thanks!
gera.

I like, as you do, #isFoo (#isEndOfPacket) for the test method.

For setting/unsetting, typically I (in Delphi, admittedly) have a property to which I assign a value. Translated into Smalltalk, that gives #isEndOfPacket: aBoolean. An alternative might be #setEndOfPacket/#unsetEndOfPacket.

I had a stroll around Squeak 3.8, and HaloMorph for instance has a #isMagicHalo/#isMagicHalo: aBoolean pair. Several other classes use that pattern, so ja, I'd vote for

isEndOfPacket (test) isEndOfPacket: true (set) isEndOfPacket: false (clear)

frank