On Apr 18, 2009, at 5:44 , Hendrik van Rooyen wrote:
"baykus" <b......@gmail.com> wrote:
I guess I did not articulate myself well enough. I was just looking
for a toy to play around. I never suggested that Python+Basic
would be
better than Python and everyone should use it. Python is Python and
Basic is Basic. I am not comparing them at all. I understand the
merits of Python but that does not mean I can play with ideas?
Apparently this is not allowed by the CS thought police.
to untangle some spaghetti code. He did not mention if
the spaghetti was actually doing it's job, bug free, which
IMO is the only rational test for the quality of a piece
of code, because it is the reason for its existence.
The aesthetics are, like all aesthetics, a matter of opinion.
Actually, I strongly disagree with this statement. In my experience,
there has been very very few pieces of code that I've written that I
hadn't wanted to *modify* at some point: extend it to a new set of
circumstances, cover a different case, change the output, etc... The
quality of a piece of code is not just if it works right now, but if
you can reasonably extend it for the future. I toyed with Perl for a
year or so, but couldn't give it my full attention. As a result,
every few weeks when I wanted to modify what I wrote, I had to re-
learn the code all over again because the syntax was so terse. The
same is true for the typical use of a goto: you have to relearn the
program, because the flow jumps around. It's not just about
aesthetics, but about being able to work with a piece of code.
bb
--
Brian Blais
bbl...@bryant.edu
http://web.bryant.edu/~bblais
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