Any time I've created Schemas in Tridion implementations, I've followed the rules for how other XML Fields were named - which has typically been PascalCase: SomeFieldName.
I, and other teammates, actually have a preference for camelCase: someField.
I have a brand new Tridion implementation that I'm working on, and I'm wondering what the accepted standard for XML Field names would in our schemas.
I - like most other Tridion implementers, I'm sure - have also been confronted with this very important decision, and my conclusion has always been that
It doesn't matter as long as it is consistent
Often the challenges I've seen are more around semantics than actual grammar - making sure your "displayHeadline" field is always called "displayHeadline" on all schemas, and not (as I infuriatingly discovered on one of my own implementations) "displayTitle" for one schema and "displayHeadline" for all others.
If you want to follow XML guidelines, you won't find any real guidance either... W3C seems to favor camelCase, Microsoft favors PascalCase. More discussions of this topic here.
I think it's something you agree as a team. At Building Blocks we tend to use underscored names for XML names e.g some_field.
I don't think there's a "right" way of naming, as long as it's consistent throughout the implementation (and valid XML!)
OK - I'm going to pitch in with the same damn answer....
It doesn't matter as long as it's consistent
... but I'd like to add
If you don't make it easy to type from memory, you will hate yourself.
I agreed completely with Nuno's answer above, but wanted to add my two cents.
The rule of:
It doesn't matter as long as it is consistent
Is really important to me as I use it when writing my templates. I'm able to know the naming rules of the schema field so that I can really pump out dwt without having to keep checking the names of the schema / component XML.
I am in agreement with Nuno and also with Dominic.
Generally if you go with naming conventions, Pascal cases are generally specified for methods and camel cases for local variables in a programming methodology (Microsoft).
In XML there is no such specified naming convention, though most of the professional recommend using lower case or camel case.
In my personal opinion, though it is the consistency which matter but I recommend using a lower case. The only advantage will be if there is any string parsing and comparison happening(though it might not be a best practice, yet you never know), it will give you an edge over camel case xml tags. Also, this comes up with a slight disadvantages in readability.
