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I'd suggest an alternate approach: add enough commentary to your one-liners so that a reader can parse that instead of the statement. Bugs can hide in the expan

I'd suggest an alternate approach: add enough commentary to your one-liners so that a reader can parse that instead of the statement. Bugs can hide in the expanded versions of code just as easily. By offering the reader of the code a clear summary of the next one-liner, they can quickly scan it if they are trying to find a bug nearby and decide if it is potentially the culprit. On top of that, consider making every bit of clever code a reusable library snippet instead. If it becomes part of the vocabulary of your codebase it'll be easier for others to understand it by looking at call sites. eg: # Capitalize the first letter of every word @sentence = @sentence.split(' ').map!{|x| x = x[0..0].upcase << x[1..-1]}.join(' ')

bradlenox 11y ago
I agree. Someone's "darling" code might be a truly innovative or unique way of solving a problem, and providing enough commentary should help avoid the problems the author warns about.
- mhurron 11y ago
  It's amazing, their whole complaint is solved by proper software development practices - Comment your code.
  - CaptSpify 11y ago
    To be fair: What is proper practice, is far from what is common practice
  - prodigal_erik 11y ago
    Code that's clear enough not to need a comment is better than code that has a comment. Comments can be outdated or mistaken and they consume screen real estate.
    - mhurron 11y ago
      You still need to document intent. No code is self documenting.
      - dllthomas 11y ago
        In some cases, naming may be sufficient to communicate intent.
- TTPrograms 11y ago
  Not to mention it may be a performance optimization.
  - sgt101 11y ago
    Which is a good reason, if that optimization is needed.
knodi123 11y ago
Why use "map!"? you're already working on a disposable copy of your data, there's no need to mandate "in place". Could this be done with one gsub regex? why use "x = x[0..0].upcase << x[1..-1]", instead of "x[0]=x[0].upcase; x" ? And why not use the already-written "titleize" function, which capitalizes the first letter of each word? Frankly, I think your darling needs to be put out of its misery. :-)
- boxidea 11y ago
  > already-written "titleize" function Which is a function provided by ActiveSupport. It's not part of Ruby itself.
ludamad 11y ago
I'd wrap it in a function called capitalizeWords and be done for the day. I also had 0 problem understanding the meaning of this line. If your code base is consistently made of small functions that look like this I actually don't see a major readability issue. (The article remains very valid)
- 123jay7 11y ago
  Pero ¿qué pasa con tu madre ? (But what about your mother?)
Kenji 11y ago
I haven't written a single line of Ruby in my life and I guessed that it would do that. While I 100% agree to make code readable, maybe this darling was a bad example. And yes, a comment would help with the problem of not understanding it.

bradlenox 11y ago

I agree. Someone's "darling" code might be a truly innovative or unique way of solving a problem, and providing enough commentary should help avoid the problems the author warns about.

mhurron 11y ago
It's amazing, their whole complaint is solved by proper software development practices - Comment your code.
- CaptSpify 11y ago
  To be fair: What is proper practice, is far from what is common practice
- prodigal_erik 11y ago
  Code that's clear enough not to need a comment is better than code that has a comment. Comments can be outdated or mistaken and they consume screen real estate.
  - mhurron 11y ago
    You still need to document intent. No code is self documenting.
    - dllthomas 11y ago
      In some cases, naming may be sufficient to communicate intent.
TTPrograms 11y ago
Not to mention it may be a performance optimization.
- sgt101 11y ago
  Which is a good reason, if that optimization is needed.

knodi123 11y ago

Why use "map!"? you're already working on a disposable copy of your data, there's no need to mandate "in place". Could this be done with one gsub regex? why use "x = x[0..0].upcase << x[1..-1]", instead of "x[0]=x[0].upcase; x" ? And why not use the already-written "titleize" function, which capitalizes the first letter of each word? Frankly, I think your darling needs to be put out of its misery. :-)

boxidea 11y ago
> already-written "titleize" function Which is a function provided by ActiveSupport. It's not part of Ruby itself.

ludamad 11y ago

I'd wrap it in a function called capitalizeWords and be done for the day. I also had 0 problem understanding the meaning of this line. If your code base is consistently made of small functions that look like this I actually don't see a major readability issue. (The article remains very valid)

123jay7 11y ago
Pero ¿qué pasa con tu madre ? (But what about your mother?)

Kenji 11y ago

I haven't written a single line of Ruby in my life and I guessed that it would do that. While I 100% agree to make code readable, maybe this darling was a bad example. And yes, a comment would help with the problem of not understanding it.