This old chestnut from Joel should be helpful (or at least entertaining): http://www.joelonsoftware.com/articles/Wrong.html http://www.joelonsoftware.com/articl

This old chestnut from Joel should be helpful (or at least entertaining): http://www.joelonsoftware.com/articles/Wrong.html http://www.joelonsoftware.com/articles/Wrong.html He eventually gets to "hungarian notation" (those redundant prefixes you don't like) towards the end of the piece. tl;dr: misinterpretation of a good idea, cargo-culted down through the ages.