DEV Community

Cover image for What’s your placeholder name?

What’s your placeholder name?

Bruno Noriller on May 08, 2022

We all know foo, bar, and baz. But when I see people actually needing a placeholder name for a function or variable... I’ve often seen other placeh...
Collapse
 
joelbonetr profile image
JoelBonetR 🥇

It's a no brainer to me, I just use const a = whatever then comes b then c... 😅

Collapse
 
noriller profile image
Bruno Noriller

can't go wrong with the classics

Collapse
 
lupree profile image
Luca Ramseyer

actually very smart 🤔

Collapse
 
joelbonetr profile image
JoelBonetR 🥇

This way I can get 26 letters and then start using numbers like const a0, a1, a2... 😂
Usually I don't need more than a c but well

Collapse
 
fen1499 profile image
Fen • Edited

"aux" as in auxiliary, or some random letter. In the past I didn't kept them as placeholders but as actual variable names. Eventually I came back to some few months old code and had to deal with something like:

int a(int x, int y, int* z) {
 ...
return aux;
}
Enter fullscreen mode Exit fullscreen mode
Collapse
 
darkwiiplayer profile image
𒎏Wii 🏳️‍⚧️

tester(), shenanigans() and sometimes just bob()

Collapse
 
pandademic profile image
Pandademic

I've definitely had my fair share of bobs(Is that the plural form?)

Collapse
 
noriller profile image
Bruno Noriller

I've used my fair share of "shenanigans" also

Collapse
 
auroratide profile image
Timothy Foster

I almost always use fruits and vegetables! Nearly universal, paints an image in the head, makes whiteboards colorful, etc. When testing things with arrays, you can create illustrative categories like const red = [apple, tomato].

Collapse
 
yaythomas profile image
yaythomas • Edited

my code is littered with arb. . . as in arbitrary. :-D

not var names in any production code, mind you, but any arbitrary placeholder/token value for a str, especially in unit tests:
github.com/pypyr/pypyr/search?q=arb

Collapse
 
ben profile image
Ben Halpern

"hello", "goodbye", "magoo"

Collapse
 
diballesteros profile image
Diego (Relatable Code)

Alright +1 for the oogabooga

Collapse
 
lionelrowe profile image
lionel-rowe

Oh I thought this was gonna be about placeholder names for when public Wi-Fi hotspots ask way too many personal questions to use their network. In which case, I'm namey.mcnameson@onlyfans.gov, pleased to make your acquaintance.

Collapse
 
abhinav1217 profile image
Abhinav Kulshreshtha

I don't use placeholders for programming. variables, functions, classes should all be related to module I am working on. But for user-testing, db seeding, etc, I have habit of using existing information of frictional characters created by old writers.

Characters from edgar allen poe, enid blyton, james hadley chase, A lot of Cartoon characters from hanna-barbera shows, Harry Potter, gods from greek mythology, characters from Indian comics. I have a personal DB of fictional addresses, from all the above mention tv-shows, books and novels which I use to feed DB and test forms.

Collapse
 
joppedc profile image
JoppeDC

Even when debugging and testing, i use somewhat logical names.

‘function logUser(User $user)’

‘private string $tempLocale = “en”:’

Stuff like that. Sometimes these stay till the next day or after a weekend. and it helps me pick up where i left off without searching what they mean/do.

Collapse
 
j471n profile image
Jatin Sharma

There are many a-z, dd,dddd (repeated letters), test, check, fuck(yeh i use that) etc.

Collapse
 
dylanlacey profile image
Dylan Lacey

BEEEEEEES!

Collapse
 
arikaturika profile image
Arika O

Dinosaur or banana. No idea why.

Collapse
 
jrop profile image
Jonathan Apodaca

bleh

Collapse
 
lupree profile image
Luca Ramseyer

this one is kinda funny tho xD

Collapse
 
stcollier profile image
Samuel Collier

I use "test" for everything. let test, function test(), etc.

Collapse
 
chuniversiteit profile image
Chun Fei Lung

I use derp and sdg so often that some of them have even made it to production. 💀

Collapse
 
flrichar profile image
Fred Richards

I try to make up funny words like zerk, zalg, blerp, blurg, any 4-5 letter which may sound like it does not belong and for some unknown reason I choose a lot of the letters a, b, x, z.

Collapse
 
lupree profile image
Luca Ramseyer

I always use "lul" and if this is already used I use "lulul" and so on. (Not very smart, I do not recommend, it just kind of works for me)

Collapse
 
noriller profile image
Bruno Noriller

as long as you don't commit it...

Collapse
 
panditapan profile image
Pandita

I use "hello" and if it's a string then "stringy". I always use Pandita Pan as a placeholder user too xD

Collapse
 
stephd profile image
DepSteph

I use 'dada', because of finger position

Collapse
 
sunflowertoadtheorbiter profile image
SunflowerToadTheOrbiter • Edited

Fine choice sir, I tend to prefer ogabooga

Collapse
 
smppatel99999 profile image
Sahil Patel

Anything that's related to the function.

Collapse
 
alida profile image
Alida W

To test address fields: Testy Testerson, 123 Any Street, Townsville, Country. (123) 456 7890, test@test.com

To test inputs, I usually just write "help", hahaha.

Collapse
 
matthewbdaly profile image
Matthew Daly

I tend to use sitcom characters, particularly from The IT Crowd.

Collapse
 
eljayadobe profile image
Eljay-Adobe

For variables, they are called metasyntactic variables. Placeholder variables. There is a wikipedia entry with lots of them. And an entry in the catb.org hacker's dictionary.

Collapse
 
ironcladdev profile image
Conner Ow

Mine is usually "asdf", and for longer text stuff, I use "Lorem Ipsum dolor sit amet this text goes on forever and its end is never met"

Collapse
 
andrewbaisden profile image
Andrew Baisden

I keep it simple and stick with test.

Collapse
 
dumboprogrammer profile image
Tawhid

"disstring" "disint" "al" "bl" . I have the funniest ways to name a var and a function

Collapse
 
kenbellows profile image
Ken Bellows

Maaaan the minute I saw that cover image my mouth started watering lol, I haven't had coxinha in ages!

Collapse
 
skylersaville profile image
Skyler Saville

Bobby Socks

Collapse
 
twigman08 profile image
Chad Smith

I’ve honestly sat for way too long trying to think of a test variable or function name that I finally just typed out gibberish and used that.

Collapse
 
noriller profile image
Bruno Noriller

ok, but is it like jane_doe, jane-doe, janeDoe or you're working with a language that lets you "jane doe"?

Collapse
 
arnested profile image
Arne Jørgensen

hest -- Danish for horse

Collapse
 
clpsplug profile image
C. Plug

Some Japanese use "hoge" "fuga" "piyo" for placeholder names - though I hear they are dying out and learner sometimes misunderstand that these mean something.
I use them plus the foobar style placeholders; whichever to use is up to my feeling.