Path: utzoo!attcan!uunet!ogicse!dali!uakari.primate.wisc.edu!aplcen!haven!udel!mmdf
From: V2057A%TEMPLEVM.BITNET@cornellc.cit.cornell.edu (Juan Jose Noyles)
Newsgroups: comp.os.minix
Subject: Re: Bloat costs
Message-ID: <20896@nigel.udel.EDU>
Date: 2 Jun 90 13:28:11 GMT
Sender: mmdf@udel.EDU
Lines: 44

Wain, in your tome on this subject, you stated that

a = b = c = 1;   is less readable than  a=1;b=a;c=b;  or a=1;b=1;c=1;

then you give various reasons why this is so.

I don't know about the rest of you folks, but the first instance flows a lot
better to me than either of the other two.  I'm not interested in attacking
you or your beliefs, but I think you chose the wrong reasons to believe that
the others are better than the first.

Maybe it's just my naivete, but when I do write code (after definition & design
like all good programmers), I find it more satisfying to squeeze every drop of
performance I can out of the code.  If that means I work a little harder, so
what?  I like programming, because I get paid for thinking, and its pretty ent-
ertaining (well, maybe not as much as sex or Arsenio, but...) to 'get it right'
in every way possible.

I also think your reference to first grade primers was a little warped, too.  I
don't write for first graders, and I wish everyone would get into the habit of
communicating with their peers on their level, instead of condescending or wor-
shipping them.  It'd make programs a lot easier to read.

Often, this is called optimization.  Perhaps you have noticed that it is easier
to converse with someone when you use the common base of knowledge between you?
It's similar with programming.  At some point in your relationship with a per-
son you decide that you know enough about them to call them your friend.  So it
also is with programming.  In the process of becoming friends, there are often
instances where its hard to express yourself.  As you become more familiar with
the language that your relationship understands, you learn to say more with
less words.  Your conversation is still basically intelligible to the outside
world, though.

Likewise with programming.  Since you don't worry while you're talking to your
friend about the portability of your conversation, why introduce 'needless' (I
don't know a better term) stricture at that time?  When it comes time to tell
someone else what you and your friend were talking about, the translation is so
trivial as to not be noticed.  This also holds for programming.  When you know
your friend's language well enough, you see that porting to another compiler
isn't such a big deal.

However, we all know that we don't like everyone we talk to, and discourse with
those people is nowhere nearly as pleasant as talking with friends.  That's
where we should 'program defensively'.