"Russel Winder" <rus...@russel.org.uk> wrote in message news:mailman.530.1319696613.24802.digitalmar...@puremagic.com... On Mon, 2011-10-24 at 23:04 -0500, Chante wrote: [ . . . ] > Software, though, is not like a book: it's not just text. There is > inherent design, architecture, engineering represented by source code. [ . .. ]
> I assume that you are joking here in order to stir debate. Anyone who > thinks that a book, be it fiction and hence likely just a sequence of > words, or non-fiction and this likely with figures and tables as well > as > text, does not have design, structure, architecture, etc. clearly has > no > conception of good authorship. In a follow-up post, I wrote: "With a book, the text is the end product. With software, the source code is an intermediate representation, or production machine rather than the end product. Source code is like a printing press for a specific book. It is not like the book. (These analogies are presented more for analysis, rather than in direct or opposing response)." Source code is not the end product, and is not even necessary (in text form) to create the end product. A book, OTOH, IS the end product.
