Ok all - poll of the day:

Do you declare (LOCAL, etc.) all your variables "up front" in each method/prg or do you declare them only when they're about to be used first time within the method/prg as in the case of conditional branching where the variable may not be used at all except under a particular case?

I've seen use of and arguments for both. Just like to see what everyone is doing. Also how do all of you feel about the practice of always giving a local variable a default value up front or wherever it is declared?

TIA!