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  • That was the goal that I aimed for and that was the stated object. Simplicity (or rather, the one function/operation per line) seemed to naturally follow from that goal. I'm trying to ascertain whether my understanding was invalid. When you're building a coding standards, establishing a set of rules and guidelines is the entire point of the exercise. Setting rules and guidelines that are too vague is useless. As such, this answer really doesn't help. Commented Dec 5, 2011 at 22:29
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    My argument is that setting rules that are too strict is worse than useless and is actually harmful. Setting rules like one statement per line is stylistic. This is the thing that should definitely NOT be in the code guidelines. It provides not actual benefit and can be harmful to readability and maintainability if applied without thought. Commented Dec 5, 2011 at 23:41
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    +1 (because I can't +10) A common mistake I see with new programming managers is that they try to codify every last detail. The best coding standards are more like fortune cookies than recipes. Commented Dec 6, 2011 at 1:33
  • "Coding styles and standards" was the name of the document. Obviously this isn't a standard (as in "Never use GoTo" or "Never use short ints") but a style. Unifying style is important to readability and maintainability. Commented Dec 6, 2011 at 14:17
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    Style Guide: "This project uses tabs/spaces (choose one). This project uses the brace style K&R/Allman/BSD/GNU (choose one). Please don't not add empty spaces on the end of lines. Please keep your code neat and readable. Everything will be code reviewed by two team members and yourself: for readability/maintainability you need a majority 2/3 to check in code, For Reliability, and Performance you need 3/3 (Please provide appropriate tests to prove). More rules will be added if these are abused :-)" Done. Commented Dec 6, 2011 at 16:44