Tom Garland <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> writes:
> TC304. Does anyone know if the following logical operators are globally
> understood or must they be translated for each language?
> AND
> OR
> ~ (not)
[François]
There was a discussion on the Python list, last week, on the fact that
these operators do not have a clear intuitive meaning, even in English.
Yet for old-fashioned programmers, this is generally clear. It was said
that some programming language (I forgot which) allows `and then' and
`or else' as an attempt to make things more clear.
[Alain] Right. Of course, when we talk about antedeluvian programming languages, translation is not absolutely required. Habits are already taken and in practice it is not worth it (in addition to the fact that some programmers prefer that their comments, in their native language, be not confused with the cryptic -- and mechanically interpreted -- actually programmed instructions per se).
However for any new *application*, boolean operators and mathematical functions in general exist in different languages already (mathematics were not invented yesterday). Therefore, if a product is aimed at end-users who already have a culture (who has none?) versions in different languages should typically be required (maybe not in some cases, you have to survey those languages speakers).
As François says, for example, the meaning of "OR" ("OU" en français) is also ambiguous due to bad practices encouraged by many users (in both English and French, "OR" ("OU") is by definition an inclusive OR but many consider it rather means "EITHER x OR y" ("SOIT x, SOIT y"), which is exclusive, to the point that they use the bad formula "and/or" ("et/ou") to make sure that "OR" will be even more ambiguous in the future -- I think damage is already done to both of these human languages).
Even "AND" ("ET" en français) may lead to misunderstanding, as the natural language use of these operators may *not correspond* to the boolean meaning.
Many years ago, in a "natural-language"-to-data-base interface, just to play (I know, it was vicious), I asked the following natural language sentence to the program called "Intellect" (at the time, it was on an IBM mainframe): "How many men and women are listed in the database?"... After many minutes going trough a relatively big database, I got the single answer: 0 (i.e. ZERO)... (%=
The program had provided me with the translation into a data-base programming language and it had done something like: "IF SEX=MALE AND SEX=FEMALE THEN..." Of course an optimizer could have known the answer in advance, it was not very clever programming... However how many users would believe what a machine would answer in those occasions? Unfortunately most non-programmers, to whatever question.
That is the problem I see. A big one. So yes, operators should be translated, explained, and even presented to end-users with a tutorial explaining the usual traps. This, even for English-speaking end-users. It is a matter of good user-machine interface. The user must be aware in advance of the kind of commitment he/she has contracted with the machine. So far we assume too much on both sides (programmers and end-users), only the machine is strightforward... "Garbage in, garbage out" is still quite of age.
Alain LaBonté
Québec
