| From: | Mark A Shieh SHODAN+@***.EDU |
|---|---|
| Subject: | [semi-OT] programming languages' evolution |
| Date: | Mon, 1 Feb 1999 17:10:42 -0500 (EST) |
> >I haven't noticed this to be the case. All self-documenting
> >code does is force you to produce minimal documentation. If
> >you did that anyways, it doesn't make a difference.
>
> If I understand this one right I have to disagree. There is no
> excuse for not having code documented well.
I agree, there's nothing worse than going through someone
else's undocumented code. However, I'm saying that a language that
produces self-documenting code doesn't inherently do anything unless
your coding style was pretty atrocious to begin with. If you produce
good code with documentation in a language without this ability,
you'll produce the same stuff in a language with self-documenting
code.
> Sure I can write up
> documentation, but then 5 years from now I have to have the
> source code, and the documentation and look at the
> documentation while I modify the code. Much easier to look
> at the the comments in front of a section of code etc, and see
> what it does, then to try and track it down in a manual.
Sure, definitely. But does it really make a difference
whether the documentation consists of some comments at the beginning
of each relevant section of code and some general advice in a text
document, or whether javadoc has turned the documents into html form?
> To tie this to shadowrun.....I have no idea. I'll get back to you on
> that one.
Undocumented code is almost on the scale of decompiled code
for readability. :P The only saving grace of undocumented code is
that you can sometimes track down the original programmer and get him
to give you some verbal documentation.
Mark
