Re: [OT] programming style or mental process ?
Mark,
On 4/9/21 09:34, Mark H. Wood wrote:
I've appreciated this discussion. It's caused me to think a bit more
about my use of this pattern.
[regarding tests for null references]
This has got me wondering why there is no operator for such an
irritatingly common need:
if (my_reference isNull) { ... }
Because that makes the language needlessly complicated.
-chris
-
To unsubscribe, e-mail: users-unsubscr...@tomcat.apache.org
For additional commands, e-mail: users-h...@tomcat.apache.org
Re: [OT] programming style or mental process ?
I've appreciated this discussion. It's caused me to think a bit more
about my use of this pattern.
[regarding tests for null references]
This has got me wondering why there is no operator for such an
irritatingly common need:
if (my_reference isNull) { ... }
--
Mark H. Wood
Lead Technology Analyst
University Library
Indiana University - Purdue University Indianapolis
755 W. Michigan Street
Indianapolis, IN 46202
317-274-0749
www.ulib.iupui.edu
signature.asc
Description: PGP signature
Re: [OT] programming style or mental process ?
Guten Morgen Peter :) Guten Morgen Carsten and All [...] I may add, that a French Café au lait (pronounced Olé, which is not French :-O ) is also an option. Maybe my German coffee expertise is kind of narrow and shaped by personal experience (having my coffee w/o milk)... OLE? Isn't it something used in Windows programming? *lol* Obviously, coding and coffee are very closely related... Carsten - To unsubscribe, e-mail: users-unsubscr...@tomcat.apache.org For additional commands, e-mail: users-h...@tomcat.apache.org
Re: [OT] programming style or mental process ?
Guten Morgen Carsten and All
> Am 08.04.2021 um 07:20 schrieb Carsten Klein :
>
>
>> (And dutch people. Where are they in this discussion by the way ? (but they
>> have only one type of coffee I think)).
>
> Dutch people may only have one type of coffee (actually I don't know). But
> remember, Dutch people have 'Coffee Shops' offering stuff far beyond
> coffee... :) Is there a relation between that and usage of Yoda style?
>
> Germans used to drink so called 'filter coffee' for decades, which today,
> even if served hot, many people would call 'cold coffee' ('kalter Kaffee' in
> German), an idiom that could be translated to English as 'an old hat').
>
> Now, thanks to companies like De'Longhi or Seaco (which is now owned by
> Philips and so is actually Dutch), most of us prefer Italian coffee types
> like Espresso, Cappuccino or Latte Macchiato.
>
>
I may add, that a French Café au lait (pronounced Olé, which is not French :-O
) is also an option.
Peter
> -
> To unsubscribe, e-mail: users-unsubscr...@tomcat.apache.org
> For additional commands, e-mail: users-h...@tomcat.apache.org
>
-
To unsubscribe, e-mail: users-unsubscr...@tomcat.apache.org
For additional commands, e-mail: users-h...@tomcat.apache.org
Re: [OT] programming style or mental process ?
(And dutch people. Where are they in this discussion by the way ? (but
they have only one type of coffee I think)).
Dutch people may only have one type of coffee (actually I don't know).
But remember, Dutch people have 'Coffee Shops' offering stuff far beyond
coffee... :) Is there a relation between that and usage of Yoda style?
Germans used to drink so called 'filter coffee' for decades, which
today, even if served hot, many people would call 'cold coffee' ('kalter
Kaffee' in German), an idiom that could be translated to English as 'an
old hat').
Now, thanks to companies like De'Longhi or Seaco (which is now owned by
Philips and so is actually Dutch), most of us prefer Italian coffee
types like Espresso, Cappuccino or Latte Macchiato.
-
To unsubscribe, e-mail: users-unsubscr...@tomcat.apache.org
For additional commands, e-mail: users-h...@tomcat.apache.org
Re: [OT] programming style or mental process ?
On 06.04.2021 20:06, gustavo.avitab...@unina.it wrote: To nitpick, in Spanish one would rather say "cafe frio". ... and, in Italian, "caffè freddo", but we Italians love coffee, and we have much phantasy, so try also: "granita di caffè", "caffè gelato", "caffè col ghiaccio", "il caffè s'è fatto freddo", ... Not so you'd think that Italians are the only ones with imagination when it comes to coffee, Spanish people also call this "granizado de cafe" (or "cafe granizado") or "cafe del tiempo". And that's only for the basic cold type, because there are many subtypes each with it's own name, with and without different types of liquor (flambé or not), short, medium, large or "americano" (== like water), real coffee or powder, decaffeinated or not, with or without (hot or cold) milk, in different types of recipients. And not that some people would think that this is now all totally [OT], I would remind everyone of the definite historical and cultural connections between Tomcat, Java, programming and coffee (and Jakarta). (And dutch people. Where are they in this discussion by the way ? (but they have only one type of coffee I think)). - To unsubscribe, e-mail: users-unsubscr...@tomcat.apache.org For additional commands, e-mail: users-h...@tomcat.apache.org
Re: [OT] programming style or mental process ?
Quoting "André Warnier (tomcat/perl)" :
On 05.04.2021 14:37, Christopher Schultz wrote:
Or, more literarily, given that the syntax of most (all?)
programming languages is based on English (if, then, else, new,
for, while, until, exit, continue, etc.), we (*) do normally ask
"is your coffee cold ?" and not "is cold your coffee ?".
On the other hand, in English, coffee which is not hot is called
"cold coffee" but in e.g. Spanish, it's "coffee cold".
To nitpick, in Spanish one would rather say "cafe frio".
... and, in Italian, "caffè freddo",
but we Italians love coffee, and we have much phantasy, so try also:
"granita di caffè", "caffè gelato", "caffè col ghiaccio", "il caffè
s'è fatto freddo", ...
But that's a bit beside the point since - as mentioned above - most
currently fashionable programming languages are based on English.
Nevertheless, just for the sake of it, and in some imaginary situation
in which the Java syntax would be based on Spanish, one would
probably have this :
si (nada == requerimiento.obtengaCodificaciónCarácteros()) entonces {
} sino {
}
as opposed to
si (requerimiento.obtengaCodificaciónCarácteros() == nada) entonces {
} sino {
}
.. which makes it even more striking that the first form deviates
from the human language, because "nothing" cannot really be equal to
anything, and thus the first form should always evaluate to false. (*)
(Which would also lead to more concise Java programs, because if you
already know the answer, then you don't even need to make the test
in the first place.)
On the other hand, this provides an interesting insight into
English-speaking people's thought processes, for example as to the
expression "nothing matches a good coffee in the morning", which is
undoubtedly evaluated as true by many, although logically it cannot
be.
:-)
(*) actually, this appears to be false : in Java, (null == null) is true.
See here for an in-depth discussion :
https://stackoverflow.com/questions/2707322/what-is-null-in-java
P.S.
If anyone is interested about how it would be to write programs
based on a Latin-inspired programming language, I recommend this :
https://metacpan.org/pod/distribution/Lingua-Romana-Perligata/lib/Lingua/Romana/Perligata.pm
(in which language it would be very difficult to confuse "==" and "=")
-
To unsubscribe, e-mail: users-unsubscr...@tomcat.apache.org
For additional commands, e-mail: users-h...@tomcat.apache.org
-
To unsubscribe, e-mail: users-unsubscr...@tomcat.apache.org
For additional commands, e-mail: users-h...@tomcat.apache.org
Re: [OT] programming style or mental process ?
Konstantin,
On 4/6/21 06:41, Konstantin Kolinko wrote:
вс, 4 апр. 2021 г. в 13:24, André Warnier (tomcat/perl) :
Hi.
I have a question which may be totally off-topic for this list, but this has
been puzzling
me for a while and I figure that someone here may be able to provide some clue
as to the
answer, or at least some interesting ponts of view.
In various places (including on this list), I have seen multiple occurrences of
a certain
way to write a test, namely :
if (null == request.getCharacterEncoding()) {
as opposed to
if (request.getCharacterEncoding() == null) {
Granted, the two are equivalent in the end.
Some programming languages have rules, in what order an expression is
evaluated. E.g. the left side is evaluated first, the result is stored
in a register (memory) of a CPU, then the right side is evaluated and
the result is stored, then it is followed by a comparison and a
conditional jump. Thus the two variants are not equivalent.
(Well, as null is a zero and not really a specific value, maybe it
does not need evaluation and a memory register to store it.)
JVM uses a stack and not registers, but of course many architectures
(like most RISC) do use registers under the hood, so there is a bit of
mapping here and there, at multiple levels. Then x86 is accumlator-based
but also has a few registers, and that number grows with each processor
revision.
Anyhow, Java bytecode has primitives for loading null values onto the
stack, so it both has a definite value (probably 0, I've never bothered
to dig into it too much) and it is definitely loaded into registers
(well, onto the stack).
Further, JLS says that class members without explicit definitions get
whatever the equivalent of "0" is in their data type. References are
assigned "null", so null is probably == 0, though they could go
old-school and use 0xdeadbeef like some C compilers back in the day.
In Java the Java Language Specification dictates the evaluation order,
"15.7.1 Evaluate Left-Hand Operand First". I vaguely remember that in
the C language the evaluation order in such expressions is
unspecified.
https://docs.oracle.com/javase/specs/
If one side of an expression can have unexpected side effects (like a
function call or a null pointer dereference can have), I prefer them
to be evaluated first. Thus my preference is for
"(request.getCharacterEncoding() == null)".
Otherwise, another point of view to consider is readability of the
code. If the function call is some lengthy expression, " (null ==
request.getCharacterEncoding()) " may be more readable when formatting
the code results in wrapping the lengthy expression, splitting it into
several lines.
I think that I should also mention the well-known construct when a
comparison is done by calling the "equals()" method on some constant
value:
CONSTANT_VALUE.equals(someFunction())
In this case the "CONSTANT_VALUE" is known to be non-null, and thus
calling its method cannot result in a NullPointerException. (In more
complex cases the static method "Objects.equals()" helps to compare
two values in a null-aware way).
In a way, this makes "null == thing" more consistent, because null is
the constant in this case. You can't call null.equals(), of course, but
it's the same idea... though for the opposite reason: in your case, you
want to avoid both NPE and needless null-avoidance code.
-chris
-
To unsubscribe, e-mail: users-unsubscr...@tomcat.apache.org
For additional commands, e-mail: users-h...@tomcat.apache.org
Re: [OT] programming style or mental process ?
вс, 4 апр. 2021 г. в 13:24, André Warnier (tomcat/perl) :
>
> Hi.
> I have a question which may be totally off-topic for this list, but this has
> been puzzling
> me for a while and I figure that someone here may be able to provide some
> clue as to the
> answer, or at least some interesting ponts of view.
>
> In various places (including on this list), I have seen multiple occurrences
> of a certain
> way to write a test, namely :
>
>if (null == request.getCharacterEncoding()) {
>
> as opposed to
>
>if (request.getCharacterEncoding() == null) {
>
> Granted, the two are equivalent in the end.
Some programming languages have rules, in what order an expression is
evaluated. E.g. the left side is evaluated first, the result is stored
in a register (memory) of a CPU, then the right side is evaluated and
the result is stored, then it is followed by a comparison and a
conditional jump. Thus the two variants are not equivalent.
(Well, as null is a zero and not really a specific value, maybe it
does not need evaluation and a memory register to store it.)
In Java the Java Language Specification dictates the evaluation order,
"15.7.1 Evaluate Left-Hand Operand First". I vaguely remember that in
the C language the evaluation order in such expressions is
unspecified.
https://docs.oracle.com/javase/specs/
If one side of an expression can have unexpected side effects (like a
function call or a null pointer dereference can have), I prefer them
to be evaluated first. Thus my preference is for
"(request.getCharacterEncoding() == null)".
Otherwise, another point of view to consider is readability of the
code. If the function call is some lengthy expression, " (null ==
request.getCharacterEncoding()) " may be more readable when formatting
the code results in wrapping the lengthy expression, splitting it into
several lines.
I think that I should also mention the well-known construct when a
comparison is done by calling the "equals()" method on some constant
value:
CONSTANT_VALUE.equals(someFunction())
In this case the "CONSTANT_VALUE" is known to be non-null, and thus
calling its method cannot result in a NullPointerException. (In more
complex cases the static method "Objects.equals()" helps to compare
two values in a null-aware way).
Best regards,
Konstantin Kolinko
-
To unsubscribe, e-mail: users-unsubscr...@tomcat.apache.org
For additional commands, e-mail: users-h...@tomcat.apache.org
Re: [OT] programming style or mental process ?
On 05.04.2021 14:37, Christopher Schultz wrote:
Or, more literarily, given that the syntax of most (all?) programming languages is based
on English (if, then, else, new, for, while, until, exit, continue, etc.), we (*) do
normally ask "is your coffee cold ?" and not "is cold your coffee ?".
On the other hand, in English, coffee which is not hot is called "cold coffee" but in e.g.
Spanish, it's "coffee cold".
To nitpick, in Spanish one would rather say "cafe frio".
But that's a bit beside the point since - as mentioned above - most currently fashionable
programming languages are based on English.
Nevertheless, just for the sake of it, and in some imaginary situation
in which the Java syntax would be based on Spanish, one would probably have
this :
si (nada == requerimiento.obtengaCodificaciónCarácteros()) entonces {
} sino {
}
as opposed to
si (requerimiento.obtengaCodificaciónCarácteros() == nada) entonces {
} sino {
}
.. which makes it even more striking that the first form deviates from the human language,
because "nothing" cannot really be equal to anything, and thus the first form should
always evaluate to false. (*)
(Which would also lead to more concise Java programs, because if you already know the
answer, then you don't even need to make the test in the first place.)
On the other hand, this provides an interesting insight into English-speaking people's
thought processes, for example as to the expression "nothing matches a good coffee in the
morning", which is undoubtedly evaluated as true by many, although logically it cannot be.
:-)
(*) actually, this appears to be false : in Java, (null == null) is true.
See here for an in-depth discussion :
https://stackoverflow.com/questions/2707322/what-is-null-in-java
P.S.
If anyone is interested about how it would be to write programs based on a Latin-inspired
programming language, I recommend this :
https://metacpan.org/pod/distribution/Lingua-Romana-Perligata/lib/Lingua/Romana/Perligata.pm
(in which language it would be very difficult to confuse "==" and "=")
-
To unsubscribe, e-mail: users-unsubscr...@tomcat.apache.org
For additional commands, e-mail: users-h...@tomcat.apache.org
Re: [OT] programming style or mental process ?
All,
On 4/5/21 16:20, Christopher Schultz wrote:
Peter,
On 4/5/21 12:35, Peter Kreuser wrote:
All,
Am 05.04.2021 um 14:38 schrieb Christopher Schultz
:
André,
On 4/4/21 06:23, André Warnier (tomcat/perl) wrote:
Hi.
I have a question which may be totally off-topic for this list, but
this has been puzzling me for a while and I figure that someone here
may be able to provide some clue as to the answer, or at least some
interesting ponts of view.
In various places (including on this list), I have seen multiple
occurrences of a certain way to write a test, namely :
if (null == request.getCharacterEncoding()) {
as opposed to
if (request.getCharacterEncoding() == null) {
Granted, the two are equivalent in the end.
But it would seem to me, maybe naively, that the second form better
corresponds to some "semantic logic", by which one wants to know if
a certain a-priori unknown piece of data (here the value obtained by
retrieving the character encoding of the current request) is defined
(not null) or not (null).
Said another way : we don't want to know if "null" is equal to
anything; we want to know if request.getCharacterEncoding() is null
or not.
Or in yet another way : the focus (or the "subject" of the test)
here is on "request.getCharacterEncoding()" (which we don't know),
and not on "null" (which we know already).
Or, more literarily, given that the syntax of most (all?)
programming languages is based on English (if, then, else, new, for,
while, until, exit, continue, etc.), we (*) do normally ask "is your
coffee cold ?" and not "is cold your coffee ?".
On the other hand, in English, coffee which is not hot is called
"cold coffee" but in e.g. Spanish, it's "coffee cold".
So why do (some) people write it the other way ?
I personally put the null first because of my background in C. C
compilers (especially older ones) would happily compile this code
without batting an eyelash:
char *s;
s = call_some_function();
if(s = null) {
// do some stuff
}
Guess what? "Do some stuff" is always executed, and s is always null.
If you switch the operands, the compiler will fail because you can't
assign a value to null:
if(null = s ) {
// Compiler will refuse to compile
}
Isn‘t it true that only one bit difference would result in false - so
result would not have to be completely tested?
I'm not sure what you mean, here.
This isn't an issue in Java: conditional predicates (the stuff inside
the "if" statement) must be boolean expressions. C and C++ will both
happily cast a number to what programmers typically consider to be a
boolean (remember: C doesn't actually have a boolean data type), and for
that it uses the truthiness of the number to determine what to do.
In C, NULL (the constant) is typically defined to be (void*)0, and
(surprise!) the only truthy numeric value in C is 0. So,
if(s = NULL) {
// Stuff
}
does two things:
1. Assigns the value of 0 to s (nulling-out any pointer you had)
and
2. Executes the body of the conditional, since 0 is considered true
Chuck didn't have the heart to publicly point out that this is 100%
wrong, but it is. He s=guessed correctly that I was remembering that a 0
return value from many functions means "all is well" or similar.
Actually, I was remembering that strcmp returns 0 when the strings are
equal, and so you need to logically-invert that value when checking to
see if two strings are equal:
if(!strcmp("foo", "bar")) {
// confusingly, "foo" and "bar" are evidently equal...
}
In C, this can be disastrous for a few reasons, not the least of which
is the simple (lack of) correctness of the behavior relative to the
programmer's likely intent: nulling a pointer can lead to memory leaks.
So, let's re-do that example again, shall we?
if(s = NULL) {
// Stuff
}
This will null-out your pointer and *not* execute the stuff you should
do when your pointer is NULL.
It gets more fun when you do something like this:
if(s = NULL) {
// Stuff
} else {
free(s); // boom
}
:(
Anyway, the whole point is that I tend to lead with rvalues as they are
not assignable, and therefore trigger compiler errors for simple typos
which are syntactically valid in C. This is much less of an issue in
Java, and one of the reasons it's a "safer" language than C.
-chris
-
To unsubscribe, e-mail: users-unsubscr...@tomcat.apache.org
For additional commands, e-mail: users-h...@tomcat.apache.org
Re: [OT] programming style or mental process ?
Peter,
On 4/5/21 12:35, Peter Kreuser wrote:
All,
Am 05.04.2021 um 14:38 schrieb Christopher Schultz
:
André,
On 4/4/21 06:23, André Warnier (tomcat/perl) wrote:
Hi.
I have a question which may be totally off-topic for this list, but this has
been puzzling me for a while and I figure that someone here may be able to
provide some clue as to the answer, or at least some interesting ponts of view.
In various places (including on this list), I have seen multiple occurrences of
a certain way to write a test, namely :
if (null == request.getCharacterEncoding()) {
as opposed to
if (request.getCharacterEncoding() == null) {
Granted, the two are equivalent in the end.
But it would seem to me, maybe naively, that the second form better corresponds to some
"semantic logic", by which one wants to know if a certain a-priori unknown
piece of data (here the value obtained by retrieving the character encoding of the
current request) is defined (not null) or not (null).
Said another way : we don't want to know if "null" is equal to anything; we
want to know if request.getCharacterEncoding() is null or not.
Or in yet another way : the focus (or the "subject" of the test) here is on
"request.getCharacterEncoding()" (which we don't know), and not on "null" (which we know
already).
Or, more literarily, given that the syntax of most (all?) programming languages is based on English
(if, then, else, new, for, while, until, exit, continue, etc.), we (*) do normally ask "is
your coffee cold ?" and not "is cold your coffee ?".
On the other hand, in English, coffee which is not hot is called "cold coffee" but in
e.g. Spanish, it's "coffee cold".
So why do (some) people write it the other way ?
I personally put the null first because of my background in C. C compilers
(especially older ones) would happily compile this code without batting an
eyelash:
char *s;
s = call_some_function();
if(s = null) {
// do some stuff
}
Guess what? "Do some stuff" is always executed, and s is always null.
If you switch the operands, the compiler will fail because you can't assign a
value to null:
if(null = s ) {
// Compiler will refuse to compile
}
Isn‘t it true that only one bit difference would result in false - so result
would not have to be completely tested?
I'm not sure what you mean, here.
This isn't an issue in Java: conditional predicates (the stuff inside
the "if" statement) must be boolean expressions. C and C++ will both
happily cast a number to what programmers typically consider to be a
boolean (remember: C doesn't actually have a boolean data type), and for
that it uses the truthiness of the number to determine what to do.
In C, NULL (the constant) is typically defined to be (void*)0, and
(surprise!) the only truthy numeric value in C is 0. So,
if(s = NULL) {
// Stuff
}
does two things:
1. Assigns the value of 0 to s (nulling-out any pointer you had)
and
2. Executes the body of the conditional, since 0 is considered true
In C, this can be disastrous for a few reasons, not the least of which
is the simple (lack of) correctness of the behavior relative to the
programmer's likely intent: nulling a pointer can lead to memory leaks.
-chris
-
To unsubscribe, e-mail: users-unsubscr...@tomcat.apache.org
For additional commands, e-mail: users-h...@tomcat.apache.org
Re: [OT] programming style or mental process ?
All,
> Am 05.04.2021 um 14:38 schrieb Christopher Schultz
> :
>
> André,
>
>> On 4/4/21 06:23, André Warnier (tomcat/perl) wrote:
>> Hi.
>> I have a question which may be totally off-topic for this list, but this has
>> been puzzling me for a while and I figure that someone here may be able to
>> provide some clue as to the answer, or at least some interesting ponts of
>> view.
>> In various places (including on this list), I have seen multiple occurrences
>> of a certain way to write a test, namely :
>> if (null == request.getCharacterEncoding()) {
>> as opposed to
>> if (request.getCharacterEncoding() == null) {
>> Granted, the two are equivalent in the end.
>> But it would seem to me, maybe naively, that the second form better
>> corresponds to some "semantic logic", by which one wants to know if a
>> certain a-priori unknown piece of data (here the value obtained by
>> retrieving the character encoding of the current request) is defined (not
>> null) or not (null).
>> Said another way : we don't want to know if "null" is equal to anything; we
>> want to know if request.getCharacterEncoding() is null or not.
>> Or in yet another way : the focus (or the "subject" of the test) here is on
>> "request.getCharacterEncoding()" (which we don't know), and not on "null"
>> (which we know already).
>> Or, more literarily, given that the syntax of most (all?) programming
>> languages is based on English (if, then, else, new, for, while, until, exit,
>> continue, etc.), we (*) do normally ask "is your coffee cold ?" and not "is
>> cold your coffee ?".
>
> On the other hand, in English, coffee which is not hot is called "cold
> coffee" but in e.g. Spanish, it's "coffee cold".
>
>> So why do (some) people write it the other way ?
>
> I personally put the null first because of my background in C. C compilers
> (especially older ones) would happily compile this code without batting an
> eyelash:
>
> char *s;
>
> s = call_some_function();
>
> if(s = null) {
>// do some stuff
> }
>
> Guess what? "Do some stuff" is always executed, and s is always null.
>
> If you switch the operands, the compiler will fail because you can't assign a
> value to null:
>
> if(null = s ) {
>// Compiler will refuse to compile
> }
>
Isn‘t it true that only one bit difference would result in false - so result
would not have to be completely tested?
Peter
> So it's a defensive programming technique for me.
>
>> Is it purely a question of individual programming style ?
>
> Perhaps at this stage in history, it is only "style". But it does have a
> practical
>
>> Is there some (temporary ?) fashion aspect involved ?
>> Do the people who write this either way really think in a different way ?
>> Or is there really something "technical" behind this, which makes one or the
>> other way be slightly more efficient (whether to compile, or optimise, or
>> run) ?
>> (*) excepting Yoda of course
>
> -chris
>
>
> -
> To unsubscribe, e-mail: users-unsubscr...@tomcat.apache.org
> For additional commands, e-mail: users-h...@tomcat.apache.org
>
-
To unsubscribe, e-mail: users-unsubscr...@tomcat.apache.org
For additional commands, e-mail: users-h...@tomcat.apache.org
Re: [OT] programming style or mental process ?
André,
On 4/4/21 06:23, André Warnier (tomcat/perl) wrote:
Hi.
I have a question which may be totally off-topic for this list, but this
has been puzzling me for a while and I figure that someone here may be
able to provide some clue as to the answer, or at least some interesting
ponts of view.
In various places (including on this list), I have seen multiple
occurrences of a certain way to write a test, namely :
if (null == request.getCharacterEncoding()) {
as opposed to
if (request.getCharacterEncoding() == null) {
Granted, the two are equivalent in the end.
But it would seem to me, maybe naively, that the second form better
corresponds to some "semantic logic", by which one wants to know if a
certain a-priori unknown piece of data (here the value obtained by
retrieving the character encoding of the current request) is defined
(not null) or not (null).
Said another way : we don't want to know if "null" is equal to anything;
we want to know if request.getCharacterEncoding() is null or not.
Or in yet another way : the focus (or the "subject" of the test) here is
on "request.getCharacterEncoding()" (which we don't know), and not on
"null" (which we know already).
Or, more literarily, given that the syntax of most (all?) programming
languages is based on English (if, then, else, new, for, while, until,
exit, continue, etc.), we (*) do normally ask "is your coffee cold ?"
and not "is cold your coffee ?".
On the other hand, in English, coffee which is not hot is called "cold
coffee" but in e.g. Spanish, it's "coffee cold".
So why do (some) people write it the other way ?
I personally put the null first because of my background in C. C
compilers (especially older ones) would happily compile this code
without batting an eyelash:
char *s;
s = call_some_function();
if(s = null) {
// do some stuff
}
Guess what? "Do some stuff" is always executed, and s is always null.
If you switch the operands, the compiler will fail because you can't
assign a value to null:
if(null = s ) {
// Compiler will refuse to compile
}
So it's a defensive programming technique for me.
Is it purely a question of individual programming style ?
Perhaps at this stage in history, it is only "style". But it does have a
practical
Is there some (temporary ?) fashion aspect involved ?
Do the people who write this either way really think in a different way ?
Or is there really something "technical" behind this, which makes one or
the other way be slightly more efficient (whether to compile, or
optimise, or run) ?
(*) excepting Yoda of course
-chris
-
To unsubscribe, e-mail: users-unsubscr...@tomcat.apache.org
For additional commands, e-mail: users-h...@tomcat.apache.org
Re: [OT] programming style or mental process ?
On 05.04.2021 00:21, Zala Pierre GOUPIL wrote: In your case, with a function call, this wouldn't make a difference "if(request.getCharacterEncoding() = null)" would be illegal syntax as well, but "if(someObject = null)" is perfectly legal, but doesn't express the author's intent clearly: Is it a smart person who's taking a shortcut, or a newbie using the wrong operator? Let the seasoned programmer who's never made that same mistake throw the first stone. I think I never did that mistake. Or at least, I didn't realize it. J'ai jamais tué d'chats Ou alors y'a longtemps Ou bien j'ai oublié Ou ils sentaient pas bon (Jacques Brel - Ces gens-là) Couldn't resist. - To unsubscribe, e-mail: users-unsubscr...@tomcat.apache.org For additional commands, e-mail: users-h...@tomcat.apache.org
Re: [OT] programming style or mental process ?
> > > > In your case, with a function call, this wouldn't make a difference > > "if(request.getCharacterEncoding() = null)" would be illegal syntax as > > well, but "if(someObject = null)" is perfectly legal, but doesn't > > express the author's intent clearly: Is it a smart person who's taking a > > shortcut, or a newbie using the wrong operator? > > > > Let the seasoned programmer who's never made that same mistake throw the > first stone. > I think I never did that mistake. Or at least, I didn't realize it.
Re: [OT] programming style or mental process ?
On 04.04.2021 12:57, Olaf Kock wrote:
Hi André
On 04.04.21 12:23, André Warnier (tomcat/perl) wrote:
if (null == request.getCharacterEncoding()) {
as opposed to
if (request.getCharacterEncoding() == null) {
So why do (some) people write it the other way ?
Is it purely a question of individual programming style ?
Is there some (temporary ?) fashion aspect involved ?
Do the people who write this either way really think in a different way ?
Or is there really something "technical" behind this, which makes one
or the other way be slightly more efficient (whether to compile, or
optimise, or run) ?
(*) excepting Yoda of course
I can't say I'm always writing Yoda style, but if I stretch my memory,
then the rationale behind this style of comparisons is to have a
constant on the left side, so that you get a compiler error in case
you're using = instead of ==.
I like that explanation, in the sense that it provides a programming rationale for using
the first form (and not only in Java), even if it feels intuitively un-natural.
So it's apparently not only fashion or Yoda fandom.
Thanks.
In your case, with a function call, this wouldn't make a difference
"if(request.getCharacterEncoding() = null)" would be illegal syntax as
well, but "if(someObject = null)" is perfectly legal, but doesn't
express the author's intent clearly: Is it a smart person who's taking a
shortcut, or a newbie using the wrong operator?
Let the seasoned programmer who's never made that same mistake throw the first
stone.
Of course, the style doesn't really help people new to the language, as
they first need to understand that this is something that they might
want to apply to their code. And today, with so many IDE warnings being
flagged while typing, it might be outdated, though it still clearly
expresses the intent to have a real comparison and not an assignment here.
And I agree with the other answer posted already: It makes a lot more
sense in C++ with all the implicit boolean conversions and habits of
outsmarting the code's maintainers with clever expressions.
+1 to that too.
-
To unsubscribe, e-mail: users-unsubscr...@tomcat.apache.org
For additional commands, e-mail: users-h...@tomcat.apache.org
Re: [OT] programming style or mental process ?
Hi André
On 04.04.21 12:23, André Warnier (tomcat/perl) wrote:
>
> if (null == request.getCharacterEncoding()) {
>
> as opposed to
>
> if (request.getCharacterEncoding() == null) {
>
>
> So why do (some) people write it the other way ?
> Is it purely a question of individual programming style ?
> Is there some (temporary ?) fashion aspect involved ?
> Do the people who write this either way really think in a different way ?
> Or is there really something "technical" behind this, which makes one
> or the other way be slightly more efficient (whether to compile, or
> optimise, or run) ?
>
> (*) excepting Yoda of course
>
I can't say I'm always writing Yoda style, but if I stretch my memory,
then the rationale behind this style of comparisons is to have a
constant on the left side, so that you get a compiler error in case
you're using = instead of ==.
In your case, with a function call, this wouldn't make a difference
"if(request.getCharacterEncoding() = null)" would be illegal syntax as
well, but "if(someObject = null)" is perfectly legal, but doesn't
express the author's intent clearly: Is it a smart person who's taking a
shortcut, or a newbie using the wrong operator?
Of course, the style doesn't really help people new to the language, as
they first need to understand that this is something that they might
want to apply to their code. And today, with so many IDE warnings being
flagged while typing, it might be outdated, though it still clearly
expresses the intent to have a real comparison and not an assignment here.
And I agree with the other answer posted already: It makes a lot more
sense in C++ with all the implicit boolean conversions and habits of
outsmarting the code's maintainers with clever expressions.
Olaf
-
To unsubscribe, e-mail: users-unsubscr...@tomcat.apache.org
For additional commands, e-mail: users-h...@tomcat.apache.org
Re: [OT] programming style or mental process ?
On 4/4/21 12:23 PM, André Warnier (tomcat/perl) wrote:
Hi.
I have a question which may be totally off-topic for this list, but
this has been puzzling me for a while and I figure that someone here
may be able to provide some clue as to the answer, or at least some
interesting ponts of view.
In various places (including on this list), I have seen multiple
occurrences of a certain way to write a test, namely :
if (null == request.getCharacterEncoding()) {
as opposed to
if (request.getCharacterEncoding() == null) {
Granted, the two are equivalent in the end.
But it would seem to me, maybe naively, that the second form better
corresponds to some "semantic logic", by which one wants to know if a
certain a-priori unknown piece of data (here the value obtained by
retrieving the character encoding of the current request) is defined
(not null) or not (null).
Said another way : we don't want to know if "null" is equal to
anything; we want to know if request.getCharacterEncoding() is null or
not.
Or in yet another way : the focus (or the "subject" of the test) here
is on "request.getCharacterEncoding()" (which we don't know), and not
on "null" (which we know already).
Or, more literarily, given that the syntax of most (all?) programming
languages is based on English (if, then, else, new, for, while, until,
exit, continue, etc.), we (*) do normally ask "is your coffee cold ?"
and not "is cold your coffee ?".
So why do (some) people write it the other way ?
Is it purely a question of individual programming style ?
Is there some (temporary ?) fashion aspect involved ?
Do the people who write this either way really think in a different way ?
Or is there really something "technical" behind this, which makes one
or the other way be slightly more efficient (whether to compile, or
optimise, or run) ?
Cannot find it back right now.
But I seem to remember that it came from Scott Meyers in C++ programming.
Maybe there it forces the compiler to use the right method when there is
overloading.
-
To unsubscribe, e-mail: users-unsubscr...@tomcat.apache.org
For additional commands, e-mail: users-h...@tomcat.apache.org
[OT] programming style or mental process ?
Hi.
I have a question which may be totally off-topic for this list, but this has been puzzling
me for a while and I figure that someone here may be able to provide some clue as to the
answer, or at least some interesting ponts of view.
In various places (including on this list), I have seen multiple occurrences of a certain
way to write a test, namely :
if (null == request.getCharacterEncoding()) {
as opposed to
if (request.getCharacterEncoding() == null) {
Granted, the two are equivalent in the end.
But it would seem to me, maybe naively, that the second form better corresponds to some
"semantic logic", by which one wants to know if a certain a-priori unknown piece of data
(here the value obtained by retrieving the character encoding of the current request) is
defined (not null) or not (null).
Said another way : we don't want to know if "null" is equal to anything; we want to know
if request.getCharacterEncoding() is null or not.
Or in yet another way : the focus (or the "subject" of the test) here is on
"request.getCharacterEncoding()" (which we don't know), and not on "null" (which we know
already).
Or, more literarily, given that the syntax of most (all?) programming languages is based
on English (if, then, else, new, for, while, until, exit, continue, etc.), we (*) do
normally ask "is your coffee cold ?" and not "is cold your coffee ?".
So why do (some) people write it the other way ?
Is it purely a question of individual programming style ?
Is there some (temporary ?) fashion aspect involved ?
Do the people who write this either way really think in a different way ?
Or is there really something "technical" behind this, which makes one or the other way be
slightly more efficient (whether to compile, or optimise, or run) ?
(*) excepting Yoda of course
-
To unsubscribe, e-mail: users-unsubscr...@tomcat.apache.org
For additional commands, e-mail: users-h...@tomcat.apache.org
