How to Write Professional Code

TimeFrenzied · 2025-02-16T22:20:19.154Z

please dont do this, just call your services manually with different variables

if you actually want to do something like this, I’d make a module for it, but it’s recommended to create a new variable with GetService at the top of the script for every service

Vikko151 · 2025-02-16T22:25:19.915Z

Broken Spawn:

please dont do this

Why? Why is it painful? You can even use the indexer if you forgot how a service’s called.

Like I am not doing this:

local l = "lava" local services = {CAS = game:GetService("ContextActionService"), CS = game:GetService("CollectionService")} services.CS:GetTagged(l)

Broken Spawn:

but it’s recommended to create a new variable with GetService at the top of the script for every service

Source? I think having one place to find every of my services is more comfortable. But it’s pretty subjective.

TimeFrenzied · 2025-02-16T22:26:22.806Z

Vikko151:

Source? I think having one place to find every of my services is more comfortable.

roblox.github.io

Roblox Lua Style guide

it is subjective but it just hurts my brain to have a table at the very top of a script ngl

Vikko151 · 2025-02-16T22:28:11.075Z

Broken Spawn:

it just hurts my brain to have a table at the very top of a script ngl

Putting them under your function won’t work either lol.

Anyway, I understand. It might sound strange first, but if used correctly, this can even help sometimes.

robloxdestroyer1035 · 2025-02-17T02:13:25.407Z

RS is a much more commonly used service compared to the only other service that could be abbreviated with RS, which is RunService

It’s used in videos on youtube, posts on devforum and comments on discord, really anywhere, bc its abbreviation is ubiquitous and is known to be associated with ReplicatedStorage. If I see RS in code, I know it’s replicated storage and so do others. So, it doesn’t reduce any self-documentation since anyone who’s been scripting enough on Roblox should know that RS = ReplicatedStorage.

It’s one of the more special abbreviations bc so many ppl use it, maybe the only one.

If you have a variable that u wanna call RS, call it something more meaningful then bc it’s pretty safe to say that it’s not more important than ReplicatedStorage for it to be taking its well known “RS” name.

avodey · 2025-02-17T03:28:03.132Z

Sango:

If you need comments to explain or describe your code, you are writing bad code…

Source:

VyonEXE · 2025-02-17T03:29:47.930Z

I agree with most of the points made here but personally I think that a casing style like snake_case or PascalCase would be better for readability. For me when I’m reading code that primarily uses camelCase I tend to skip over the first word or the entire variable like 80% of the time which can cause some amount of confusion, but with snake_case each word is very clearly separated and imo much easier to read. Overall though good advice

bro_proxiomFun · 2025-02-17T03:29:56.353Z

According to the naming convention, you should not abbreviate class names. And even more so those classes that need to be allocated (services/singletons)

jmesrje · 2025-02-17T03:29:56.726Z

LuckyEcho:

-- [ SERVICES ]

don’t do comments like this, it looks terrible

kiloe2 · 2025-02-17T03:49:30.882Z

yes but thats nausea inducing. Just use the underscores at that point

robloxdestroyer1035 · 2025-02-17T04:42:32.517Z

one naming convention vs another. And I’m only talking about RS in particular, as it’s always used.

DullXxxswagfoxyxxX · 2025-02-17T08:12:14.300Z

Abbreviating variables makes it generally harder to understand your code and you gain next to nothing from doing it. Its a lot easier to understand code with variables which aren’t shortened down to one to three letters, especially for newer scripters trying to learn.

robloxdestroyer1035 · 2025-02-17T09:13:31.719Z

if u know how and when to abbreviate, there should be no trouble.

Vikko151 · 2025-02-17T09:25:15.737Z

2jammers:

don’t do comments like this, it looks terrible

Broken Spawn:

please dont do this

Kelpie:

I HATE when scripting tutorials abbreviate services like ReplicatedStorage to ‘RS’

Something that I noticed, and that is actually pretty cool, is that we all got our preferences. It means that there isn’t actually a “professional” way to script stuff if it’s only aesthetics. If we had to talk about professional code, I’d be more talking about a way to code that helps.

Like, do you call a script with many comments professional? If the comments are really of a true use, like if you want to have a description for a function from another module, well, yea, I do somewhat agree. But if you comment like that:

local Workspace = game.Workspace -- This is where we're going to put the debris of the dead character

All you did is losing 30 seconds to write a comment that will helps a terribly small minority (+ this example with probably cause WW3 for some reasons). And it’s not productive. At all. Comments must only come to help if they are really needed, not to be the script’s mascara.

So, yea, if you want to publish stuff, you’re greatly advised to follow certain norms so most scripters on the internet can help you without being lost. But when it’s up to you, the most professional code is the one that allows you to be efficient.

ZakiAndrea · 2025-02-20T21:32:30.869Z

Sango:

Comments should ONLY be used for documentation generation and at most extremely niche notes and reminders. If you need comments to explain or describe your code, you are writing bad code

I think comments are helpful, I personally write them to set the start of “Services”, “Strings”, etc.
But I also use comments to describe functions, which I found helpful when I’m making many functions or just to remember what the function does.

Sango:

Another thing you should do is use asserts as much as possible.

True but false at the same time, asserts, yes do catch bugs but they throw “errors”, which can stop your code functionament, I would not use them always.

sangolemango · 2025-02-20T21:35:59.776Z

The best way to remember what a function does is to give it a descriptive name. Your code should comment itself.

Also the whole point of an assert is to crash your program or in Roblox, throw and error. This is because if an assert is trigger, it means there is a bug in your code, it’s to help you catch bugs quickly.

foilplays · 2025-02-21T02:37:50.959Z

That’s just an opinion. Countless developers use other programs like just simply Studios in general. I think it’s a personal preference and the scale of the project you’re working on.

ZakiAndrea · 2025-02-21T16:06:31.854Z

Sango:

Also the whole point of an assert is to crash your program or in Roblox, throw and error. This is because if an assert is trigger, it means there is a bug in your code, it’s to help you catch bugs quickly.

Yeah but it’s better to use them in debugging, I would prefer if statements.

gwenniekins · 2025-03-12T00:52:45.855Z

personally I use asserts to debug, but if I’ve gotten it functioning fully how I want it, including what I want and need, I just have a few if not X then return end making sure I have all the required fields, so rather than erroring, and possibly breaking stuff further down the line, it can continue seamlessly.

I also personally tend towards if statements more than asserts, since I try to have my code take as few dependencies as possible, and the ability to create stuff on the fly if it’s not been passed, which can’t be done using assert, since it halts the thread

sangolemango · 2025-03-12T12:56:26.154Z

For things that you assert, you want them to error and break. The whole point of asserts is if for any reason they fail, you have a bug. You don’t use asserts for stuff like user input