Proper location of "static" values in class files?

Question

Personally I've always put statics above any class implementations:

static NSString *const glop = @"glop";
@implementation Foo

However, I often see people use

@implementation Foo
static NSString *const glop = @"glop";

As a test I wrote a class extension and found (unsurprisingly) that this latter case does not enclose the static within the implementation - any class extension can see it as well as a function placed below the class implementation.

Is there some reason I'm unaware of to pu the static inside the implementation? I just find it ugly (but I know, everyone has a style opinion!)

David

Objective-C

481

Posted by

dhoerl

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Answer 1

As far as I know this is a style thing. Like you, I’ve seen both styles used. I don’t have a strong opinion as to which is better (then again I do most of my work in Swift these days, so the whole question is kinda moot to me).

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eskimo

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Answer 2

Again, the big problem I have with the latter case is that to a naive reader, it implies the variable is scoped when its actually not. The issue is even more incideous when you use a non-static. I just put this in a class implementation:

NSString *fooper = @"Glop";

then in another class declared fooper extern and set it. Builds without error.

Anyway, was just wondering if I had missed something.

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dhoerl

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Proper location of "static" values in class files?

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