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Programming Style: Suggested Guidelines for Writing Code

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Abstract

Since computer code has become elemental in current research it has become imperative that code should be written clearly and in good style. A program written in a clear, well‐written style is easier to debug and is more useful to those who may want to replicate your work, extend it, speed it up or borrow from it. Clearly, written code is also a useful tool in the training of future researchers. In this paper, we suggest a set of style guidelines and we provide examples of how particular elements of code can be done using the statistical packages Stata, SAS and R. We also present recommendations for how to write code.

Suggested Citation

  • Joe Hirschberg & Jenny Lye, 2024. "Programming Style: Suggested Guidelines for Writing Code," Australian Economic Review, The University of Melbourne, Melbourne Institute of Applied Economic and Social Research, vol. 57(3), pages 302-313, September.
    • Handle: RePEc:bla:ausecr:v:57:y:2024:i:3:p:302-313
    DOI: 10.1111/1467-8462.12567
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    1. Valérie Orozco & Christophe Bontemps & Elise Maigné & Virginie Piguet & Annie Hofstetter & Anne Lacroix & Fabrice Levert & Jean‐Marc Rousselle, 2020. "How To Make A Pie: Reproducible Research For Empirical Economics And Econometrics," Journal of Economic Surveys, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 34(5), pages 1134-1169, December.
    2. Lars Vilhuber, 2021. "AEA Data and Code Availability Policy," AEA Papers and Proceedings, American Economic Association, vol. 111, pages 818-823, May.
    3. Nicholas J. Cox, 2021. "Erratum: Speaking Stata: Loops, again and again," Stata Journal, StataCorp LLC, vol. 21(2), pages 555-555, June.
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