Your team doesn't follow the coding standards you or <Superprogrammer> (who isn't working for your company anymore) set up a long time ago?

Try the inverse logic strategy: Write a 200-page document with any kind of coding standards and guidelines. But here is the trick: Those standards mustn't be the ones you want to enforce, rather the ones that you don't want to be followed. Just don't tell that anyone. If everything works as expected, your team will avoid your (false) coding standards and therefore will use the standards you favor. :)


I've yet to see externally enforced coding standards to be followed by a team.
Jeremy D. Miller wrote in a blog post:

"A team is much more likely to follow a standard that they've built themselves. Let the coding standard crow organically as you encounter new needs."

I definately agree with this statement. And Jeremy has another interesting posting about "guiding" software teams.