[BigJimP]

For general shooting ...both tactical and some range practice 4" - 5" barrels seem to me, to be about right as well. Barrels that are too short ...or guns that are short in overall length sometimes can be difficult to shoot well beyond 30 feet or so ....so it kind of depends on what you expect out of your range time / or tactical practice / or do you want to shoot bullseye type skills....

But having said that .....just looking at S&W revolvers --- there are J frame, and K frame, and L frame, and N frame, etc...and each gets a little bigger ...but even within each frame size -- just changing the grips to something smooth, something checkered, rubber with finger grooves in them, wood with finger grooves in them....change the whole fit and feel of the gun ! What size Frame --- and what type and size of Grips ...that fits your hands ..might be more important than barrel length.

Same thing on semi-autos as well....length of slide / height of the gun are pretty critical issues. I can shoot a 4" barrel in a 1911 pretty well if its a full sized frame....I can't shoot a 5" barrel in a commander sized frame very well at all ( because its too short for me ) doesn't fit my hands well. A 1911 in my hands with smooth grips doesn't feel "normal" ...vs a fairly heavily checkered set of grips ...or even a "fatter" set of grips ...but while I like grips with "finger grooves on my revolvers" ...I really don't like them on my 1911's. I don't like the stock grips on a Sig 226 ....but I really like the 226 with Hogue rubber finger groove grips on it...especially if I go up in caliber from the 9mm version to the .40S&W version....

So my point is....all of this stuff matters..../ and it changes from one style or platform of gun to the other ...because the controls, grip angle, overall length, overall height, balance of the gun....are all different from one mfg to the other....