Re: [Nolug] Crappy Perl Code (was Re: Evo and Outlook)

On Sat, 2003-07-12 at 23:03, Mark A. Hershberger wrote:
> Alex McKenzie <alex@boxchain.com> writes:
[snip]
> Minimal LOC doesn't necessarily mean obfuscated or unmaintainable.
> Lisp is probably the best language out there as far as LOC and no one
> has accused it of being unmaintainable. (Yet?)

In front of your face, at your current employer. Boy, I've heard
about your crappy Lisp, let me tell you... <;-)

> When I say minimal LOC, I'm not just talking about cramming as many
> functions or operators onto as few lines as possible.
>
> Instead, I'm talking about the capability of the language. If a
> language has constructs that allow you to compactly express some
> concepts, then it reduces the LOC necessary to accomplish your goal.
>
> As I said, Lisp is the hands-down winner here. Lisp's macros reduce
> line count (by increasing expressiveness per LOC) more than anything
> else.

Where is the line between "expressiveness per LOC" and obtuseness?

> When I mentioned CPAN, I was talking about leveraging code that other
> people have written -- reducing the LOC necessary to write a finished
> product.
>
> It's amusing that you thought I was saying CPAN and Perl are good
> because there is so much crappy code.

Hey, even I figgered that out!

> > My point is that it's too easy to make a one-liner, or
> > a hundred line long one-liner, in Perl, and it's considered by some to
> > be a great thing. It's not, if others are expected to make sense of
> > it. You get all the difficulties of assembly language, with none of
> > the benefits.
>
> And my point was that you shouldn't expect a newbie to maintain code
> written by a guru, no matter what the language. Yet, this seems to
> be the subtext of the argument put forth by some people who claim
> that Perl encourages poorly written code.

But the guru should not presume that only gurus will ever see or
have to maintain his code. That's the issue, as I see it.

-- 
+-----------------------------------------------------------+
| Ron Johnson, Jr.     Home: ron.l.johnson@cox.net          |
| Jefferson, LA  USA   http://members.cox.net/ron.l.johnson |
|                                                           |
| 4 degrees from Vladimir Putin
+-----------------------------------------------------------+
___________________
Nolug mailing list
nolug@nolug.org