Bryan Sant wrote:
On 2/13/07, Shane Hathaway <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote:
Do you also agree, then, that readability is more important than
shortcuts for writing code? Eclipse shortcuts help with writing code
but do not make up for Java's verbosity.
Readability is hugely important. This is why are am a huge fan of the
Java culture, and their tendency to use
veryDescriptiveNamesForVariablesAndMethods. Long, descriptive names
are a good thing. Self documenting code is a goal we should all
strive for. Java's verbosity is a tremendous benefit.
Those long method names hurt polymorphism. It's better to have a small
set of short names that get used often. Python's dict and file APIs are
a good example; people try to reuse those method names wherever
possible, and the result is that Python code tends to be quite
interoperable.
Though java has long-ish key words, Java is verbose mostly because of
the long class and method names used in the standard libraries and by
most developers, however, there is nothing stopping you from using
Java in a terse way.
The Java culture stops me. When I write Java code, I am a member of the
Java community and must behave as one, even if I disagree with some of
the practices.
So, yes, readability is very important. Java's verbosity improves
ones ability to read Java, and IDE's make the verbosity a non-issue
when writing java.
I suspect you're defending the status quo. If short names were more
common in Java, I think you'd defend short names instead.
Shane
/*
PLUG: http://plug.org, #utah on irc.freenode.net
Unsubscribe: http://plug.org/mailman/options/plug
Don't fear the penguin.
*/
