3 ms·

> Side note: it's funny how formerly closed-source projects always open up to have tons of spaghetti code and bad design planning. I was curious after you said

by _gabe_ 4y ago

> Side note: it's funny how formerly closed-source projects always open up to have tons of spaghetti code and bad design planning. I was curious after you said this, so I took a look at the 4coder source. It looks like very straightforward code. The files are clearly marked so you know exactly what they do, the APIs look simple and reasonable, and they have clearly marked folders containing all platform specific code. I'm not sure why you put this side note here, but it doesn't seem to hold water in this case. The code is definitely not spaghetti, and it looks like it was designed with quite a bit of forethought. Edit: I would just like to add that I saw the author left several comments about the state of the code in the Readme that imply the code is very unstable. I think developers tend to be very critical of their own code, but when I took a cursory glance at the code from an outside perspective it seems much easier to follow then many other projects I've tried to take a look at. For example, for a quasi-open source project, ffmpeg is extraordinarily complex and hard to follow. So I definitely don't think OSS = super well designed code haha

seanw444 4y ago
I'll admit, I didn't actually read the codebase. I just took the notes at face value. I agree. People are harsh in review of themselves. To your second point: I think it's a matter of size for a project becoming spaghettified. ffmpeg is mature and massive, so it's no surprise it's jumbled at this point. For a project of 4coder's scale, I'd wager that being open source sooner would've benefitted its design. But, it's in the past. I'm just glad the dev left the code in the community's hands before dropping it. A lot of devs don't even do that, and the project becomes history.
maccard 4y ago
> : I would just like to add that I saw the author left several comments about the state of the code in the Readme that imply the code is very unstable. I dunno, I'm looking at their "4coder_base_types.h" header [0] and redefining basic types and builtin keywords for personal preference (yeah I know, static is overloaded) is a serious eyebrow raiser. [0] https://github.com/Dion-Systems/4coder/blob/62fe17699a99f7d21a3fbf5f3c3a283a93d12a68/custom/4coder_base_types.h https://github.com/Dion-Systems/4coder/blob/62fe17699a99f7d2...
- _gabe_ 4y ago
  You can just hover over the keyword with an IDE and instantly see that it's just a typedef for static. There's nothing wrong with doing something like this, especially since it wasn't meant to be OSS and more of a personal project until now. In addition, i32 is not an ambiguous typedef. It's way clearer that this is a 32 bit integer than `int` is. Finally, big libraries do this as well. Freetype is notorious for typedefing weird stuff like FTPos and all that. It's just one way to model the domain language in the code, and that's fine by me. If the big open source libraries can do it, what's wrong with a small one doing it too?
  - maccard 4y ago
    > You can just hover over the keyword with an IDE and instantly see that it's just a typedef for static Assuming you're browsing in an IDE, and that the IDE understands your build system. Github for example doesn't detect that it's a typedef for static. There's also the fact that the keyword `internal` is overloaded, and not in a standard way. For example, does it mean that it's not exported (a la dllexport in msvc). > In addition, i32 is not an ambiguous typedef. It's way clearer that this is a 32 bit integer than `int` is. but that's not what the typedef is to, the typedef is to int32_t which is a standard type that is guaranteed to be 32 bits. > If the big open source libraries can do it, what's wrong with a small one doing it too? typedef'ing FT_POS is totally different - FT_POS is not redefining a basic type to be used all over the project, it's defining the types used to refer to coordinates. Freetype is also written in C, and is almost 30. You also better hope that when you're using these typedefs that any third party libraries (e.g. free type) also use the same aliases.
    - sevnin 4y ago
      Internal define for static is actually really good, maybe different keyword like 'fn' would be better cause it doesn't clash with windows.h but, redefining static to a different keyword allows you to search for it in a codebase while static can be a local variable, global variable, function.
      - 4y ago

by _gabe_ 4y ago

seanw444 4y ago

I'll admit, I didn't actually read the codebase. I just took the notes at face value. I agree. People are harsh in review of themselves. To your second point: I think it's a matter of size for a project becoming spaghettified. ffmpeg is mature and massive, so it's no surprise it's jumbled at this point. For a project of 4coder's scale, I'd wager that being open source sooner would've benefitted its design. But, it's in the past. I'm just glad the dev left the code in the community's hands before dropping it. A lot of devs don't even do that, and the project becomes history.

maccard 4y ago

> : I would just like to add that I saw the author left several comments about the state of the code in the Readme that imply the code is very unstable. I dunno, I'm looking at their "4coder_base_types.h" header [0] and redefining basic types and builtin keywords for personal preference (yeah I know, static is overloaded) is a serious eyebrow raiser. [0] https://github.com/Dion-Systems/4coder/blob/62fe17699a99f7d21a3fbf5f3c3a283a93d12a68/custom/4coder_base_types.h https://github.com/Dion-Systems/4coder/blob/62fe17699a99f7d2...

_gabe_ 4y ago
You can just hover over the keyword with an IDE and instantly see that it's just a typedef for static. There's nothing wrong with doing something like this, especially since it wasn't meant to be OSS and more of a personal project until now. In addition, i32 is not an ambiguous typedef. It's way clearer that this is a 32 bit integer than `int` is. Finally, big libraries do this as well. Freetype is notorious for typedefing weird stuff like FTPos and all that. It's just one way to model the domain language in the code, and that's fine by me. If the big open source libraries can do it, what's wrong with a small one doing it too?
- maccard 4y ago
  > You can just hover over the keyword with an IDE and instantly see that it's just a typedef for static Assuming you're browsing in an IDE, and that the IDE understands your build system. Github for example doesn't detect that it's a typedef for static. There's also the fact that the keyword `internal` is overloaded, and not in a standard way. For example, does it mean that it's not exported (a la dllexport in msvc). > In addition, i32 is not an ambiguous typedef. It's way clearer that this is a 32 bit integer than `int` is. but that's not what the typedef is to, the typedef is to int32_t which is a standard type that is guaranteed to be 32 bits. > If the big open source libraries can do it, what's wrong with a small one doing it too? typedef'ing FT_POS is totally different - FT_POS is not redefining a basic type to be used all over the project, it's defining the types used to refer to coordinates. Freetype is also written in C, and is almost 30. You also better hope that when you're using these typedefs that any third party libraries (e.g. free type) also use the same aliases.
  - sevnin 4y ago
    Internal define for static is actually really good, maybe different keyword like 'fn' would be better cause it doesn't clash with windows.h but, redefining static to a different keyword allows you to search for it in a codebase while static can be a local variable, global variable, function.
    - 4y ago