Symbol Naming

In Source Insight, symbol names are stored as a "dotted path." The dotted path contains the symbol's con­tainer name, followed by a dot (.) and the symbol's name. For example, a member of a class may look like:


All symbols that have their declarations nested inside of another symbol will have a dotted path. If you look through the symbols listed in the Project Window, you will see the dotted paths. Even in languages like C++, where the scope resolution operator :: is used to declare members, the symbol name is stored internally as a dotted path.

When typing the full name of a symbol, you should use the dot in the symbol name if you want to also specify its container.

It is possible for a symbol to have an embedded dot (.) character in its name. Source Insight will store the sym­bol name so that the embedded dot is not confused with the dotted path dot character.