[magicalhippo]

I prefer single letter or short names if they don't have a specific purpose. Like for just another simple for loop, I'll use "i" instead of "elementIndex".

But if there's more to it, I prefer a proper name, even if it's used only on the line right below it.

The point is to make the code as self-documenting and readable as possible. It's always trade-offs. Sure 5000 column lines are not good. But strict 80 columns can also reduce readability. Similarly superlong or supershort identifiers aren't always good, but can be.