4 ms·

"Should array indices start at 0 or 1? My compromise of 0.5 was rejected without, I thought, proper consideration." -- Stan Kelly-Bootle

by paulmd 7y ago

travisjungroth 7y ago
I made a Python library that implemented this and gave a talk about it at PyCon: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yC9m2GInXqU&feature=youtu.be&t=330/ https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yC9m2GInXqU&feature=youtu.be...
- andai 7y ago
  Gave me a good laugh, thanks for this :) https://github.com/travisjungroth/Compromise https://github.com/travisjungroth/Compromise
- thijsvandien 7y ago
  It's at 5:30.
- yesenadam 7y ago
  So silly. I love it. The thing most worthy of the name "Python" I've seen, by a mile.
BubRoss 7y ago
Indices should start at 1, but in programming we mostly use offsets and call them indices which is one source of confusion that leads to this endless debate.
- gautamdivgi 7y ago
  A real problem and pretty sure quite a few bugs in mathematical toolsets happen because of this. It was a real pain translating formulae to code for numerical computing.
mc3 7y ago
Relevant xkcds: https://xkcd.com/394/ https://xkcd.com/394/ https://xkcd.com/1292/ https://xkcd.com/1292/
GuB-42 7y ago
There is worse. In Perl, you have the global variable $[, which lets you specify the first index of an array. One could imagine setting it to 0.5. I don't thing that would work, but with Perl being Perl, we never know. This is, of course, a terrible idea, and that feature is now deprecated. $[ is always 0 and setting it to any other value is an error.
Kaiyou 7y ago
Things would be so much simpler if they start at 0, but with 0 being reserved for the length the array is supposed to have.
- oarabbus_ 7y ago
  Things would also be so much simpler if everything started at 1.
kps 7y ago
Sadly missed. Stan Kelly-Bootle was the first person to get a postgraduate degree in computer science. For more with the flavour of the quote above, check out his Devil's Advocate column in UNIX Review¹ magazine (not much UNIX, promise) and the post-paper Son of Devil's Advocate.² ¹ https://archive.org/search.php?query=creator%3A%22Unix+Review+Magazine%22 https://archive.org/search.php?query=creator%3A%22Unix+Revie... ² https://web.archive.org/web/20161024171031/http://www.sarcheck.com/skb/index.htm https://web.archive.org/web/20161024171031/http://www.sarche...

"Should array indices start at 0 or 1? My compromise of 0.5 was rejected without, I thought, proper consideration." -- Stan Kelly-Bootle

by paulmd 7y ago

"Should array indices start at 0 or 1? My compromise of 0.5 was rejected without, I thought, proper consideration." -- Stan Kelly-Bootle

travisjungroth 7y ago

I made a Python library that implemented this and gave a talk about it at PyCon: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yC9m2GInXqU&feature=youtu.be&t=330/ https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yC9m2GInXqU&feature=youtu.be...

andai 7y ago
Gave me a good laugh, thanks for this :) https://github.com/travisjungroth/Compromise https://github.com/travisjungroth/Compromise
thijsvandien 7y ago
It's at 5:30.
yesenadam 7y ago
So silly. I love it. The thing most worthy of the name "Python" I've seen, by a mile.

BubRoss 7y ago

Indices should start at 1, but in programming we mostly use offsets and call them indices which is one source of confusion that leads to this endless debate.

gautamdivgi 7y ago
A real problem and pretty sure quite a few bugs in mathematical toolsets happen because of this. It was a real pain translating formulae to code for numerical computing.

mc3 7y ago

Relevant xkcds: https://xkcd.com/394/ https://xkcd.com/394/ https://xkcd.com/1292/ https://xkcd.com/1292/

GuB-42 7y ago

There is worse. In Perl, you have the global variable $[, which lets you specify the first index of an array. One could imagine setting it to 0.5. I don't thing that would work, but with Perl being Perl, we never know. This is, of course, a terrible idea, and that feature is now deprecated. $[ is always 0 and setting it to any other value is an error.

Kaiyou 7y ago

Things would be so much simpler if they start at 0, but with 0 being reserved for the length the array is supposed to have.

oarabbus_ 7y ago
Things would also be so much simpler if everything started at 1.

kps 7y ago

Sadly missed. Stan Kelly-Bootle was the first person to get a postgraduate degree in computer science. For more with the flavour of the quote above, check out his Devil's Advocate column in UNIX Review¹ magazine (not much UNIX, promise) and the post-paper Son of Devil's Advocate.² ¹ https://archive.org/search.php?query=creator%3A%22Unix+Review+Magazine%22 https://archive.org/search.php?query=creator%3A%22Unix+Revie... ² https://web.archive.org/web/20161024171031/http://www.sarcheck.com/skb/index.htm https://web.archive.org/web/20161024171031/http://www.sarche...