> as you said: "comments should explain things that *aren't* in the > code", not repeat the code (incorrectly) in english. your example of a > bad comment doesn't answer my question: if you are reading code and > you do not understand why it is written the way it is, don't you read > the comments to find out?
Comments allow also to see what is the code about - without needing to fully understand what is in. Comments like "this function does fast fourier transform" usually are enough to understand what the function does (if you know what FFT is) without need to look at the code and all the bloody mathematical stuff inside (if you don't know about FFT you won't have much idea about what the code does after reading it anyway). Same can be done for GPL for instance - "if you distribute GPL'd program, you must give people complete source code and give them the same rights to program you have". Maybe too simple (full details of how can source be distributed, what exactly is source, etc ... are in the license), but good enough for most people to have idea what they can and cannot do with GPL'd stuff. We need the same for ODBL. >>> did you come out of steve's evil basement portal of dooom? :-P >> >> I don't understand why people think steve has an evil portal of doom in his >> basement. It's in his attic. > > if thats in his attic, what were all those ghastly and inhuman screams > coming from his basement? Eh ... interdimensinal portal to the attic? Martin _______________________________________________ talk mailing list talk@openstreetmap.org http://lists.openstreetmap.org/listinfo/talk
