3 ms·

Is Chinese the only language with this relationship? Also, identifiers in Apple frameworks are always ASCII.

umanwizard 7y ago
They could have used Pinyin. Even people who don’t speak Chinese and have to look it up would have an easier time understanding it than trying to parse this identifier.
- SatvikBeri 7y ago
  When I put this in Google Translate, it auto-detects Japanese and gives me "outer cover." When I specify Chinese, it just says "cousin." So it's not trivial to look up.
  - umanwizard 7y ago
    Presumably you would google "CNBiaoJie" and find Apple documentation explaining the concept. (As an aside, Google Translate is a terrible way to look up the definitions of specific words. It is not a Chinese-English dictionary and doesn't try to be. Wiktionary would be a much better free option.)
  - kevingadd 7y ago
    Google translate and Bing translate are extremely unreliable for ideographic languages.
- simias 7y ago
  And then every time you re-read the code you have to look it up to understand 1/ what the hell is even this and 2/ is it the right one at the right place.
  - ridaj 7y ago
    Whereas with this English symbol that might not fit on a screen, there are none of those problems?! If the concept is foreign to you to begin with, but you have to care about it for some reason, you're going to have a bad time with either 1 or 2 no matter what the symbol is. (Though I agree that transliterating to BiaoJie would make it easier.)
  - umanwizard 7y ago
    Yes, which I think is easier than having to parse and understand this identifier every time you see it. Especially since after a few times you will remember what it means and not have to look it up anymore. There's a good reason we use jargon for complicated concepts rather than re-explaining them every time they're used. "while" is a lot easier to understand once its meaning has been explained to you than "EveryTimeWeGetHereCheckIfThisConditionIsTrueAndExecuteThisCodeBlockAndJumpBackHereIfSo".
ridaj 7y ago
I'm not sure it's the only culture having this specific relationship, but it's perhaps better to make sense to some than to none? A Chinese person, an Apple engineer and a HN reader walk into a bikeshed...

They could have used Pinyin. Even people who don’t speak Chinese and have to look it up would have an easier time understanding it than trying to parse this identifier.

SatvikBeri 7y ago
When I put this in Google Translate, it auto-detects Japanese and gives me "outer cover." When I specify Chinese, it just says "cousin." So it's not trivial to look up.
- umanwizard 7y ago
  Presumably you would google "CNBiaoJie" and find Apple documentation explaining the concept. (As an aside, Google Translate is a terrible way to look up the definitions of specific words. It is not a Chinese-English dictionary and doesn't try to be. Wiktionary would be a much better free option.)
- kevingadd 7y ago
  Google translate and Bing translate are extremely unreliable for ideographic languages.
simias 7y ago
And then every time you re-read the code you have to look it up to understand 1/ what the hell is even this and 2/ is it the right one at the right place.
- ridaj 7y ago
  Whereas with this English symbol that might not fit on a screen, there are none of those problems?! If the concept is foreign to you to begin with, but you have to care about it for some reason, you're going to have a bad time with either 1 or 2 no matter what the symbol is. (Though I agree that transliterating to BiaoJie would make it easier.)
- umanwizard 7y ago
  Yes, which I think is easier than having to parse and understand this identifier every time you see it. Especially since after a few times you will remember what it means and not have to look it up anymore. There's a good reason we use jargon for complicated concepts rather than re-explaining them every time they're used. "while" is a lot easier to understand once its meaning has been explained to you than "EveryTimeWeGetHereCheckIfThisConditionIsTrueAndExecuteThisCodeBlockAndJumpBackHereIfSo".

ridaj 7y ago

I'm not sure it's the only culture having this specific relationship, but it's perhaps better to make sense to some than to none? A Chinese person, an Apple engineer and a HN reader walk into a bikeshed...