4 ms·

Code is a kind of language. It is entirely possible to tell if person speaks clearly, easy to understand, or not. You may even train an ML model on Wikipedia se

Code is a kind of language. It is entirely possible to tell if person speaks clearly, easy to understand, or not. You may even train an ML model on Wikipedia section "Simple English". The same applies to code. It is not 100% deterministic metric, but it is relatively easy to argue and have a consensus upon.

sshine 4y ago
> it is relatively easy to argue and have a consensus upon If you’re a reasonable person, yes. But when you’re not, all kinds of crazy patterns evolve. E.g. a boss saying “I’m perfectly ok with functions that take more than 100 arguments.” (Compiler does not even support this.) and code being copy-pasted dozens of times being perfectly readable, but is a sink-hole when you refactor. Clean Code (Martin’s book, and the movement in general) is my weapon when stubborn colleagues will not listen to reason. Sometimes they will listen to authority.
wadd1e 4y ago
>It is entirely possible to tell if person speaks clearly, easy to understand, or not. Just thinking out loud here, but isn't correctness(grammar and spelling) the only thing we all(mostly) agree on? For example, someone well versed with old English literature may consider Shakespeare easy to understand, but I certainly wouldn't. I think "speaks clearly, easy to understand" are just as subjective as our notions of clean/idiomatic/readable code.
- SergeAx 4y ago
  Someone really well versed will have an understanding of how old English sounds for layperson. Also, we are discussing a situation when everyone is more or less fluent in a given [programming] language, and the probable culprit is just flexing their recently gained obscure expressions or constructing overcomplex one-liners.
ebiester 4y ago
Are you in Bangalore, Mississippi, or Edinburgh? All three can talk with those in the same accent and dialect easily but are going to labor when talking with each other. What happens when half of your code uses functional patterns and the other half imperative/OO?

sshine 4y ago

> it is relatively easy to argue and have a consensus upon If you’re a reasonable person, yes. But when you’re not, all kinds of crazy patterns evolve. E.g. a boss saying “I’m perfectly ok with functions that take more than 100 arguments.” (Compiler does not even support this.) and code being copy-pasted dozens of times being perfectly readable, but is a sink-hole when you refactor. Clean Code (Martin’s book, and the movement in general) is my weapon when stubborn colleagues will not listen to reason. Sometimes they will listen to authority.

wadd1e 4y ago

>It is entirely possible to tell if person speaks clearly, easy to understand, or not. Just thinking out loud here, but isn't correctness(grammar and spelling) the only thing we all(mostly) agree on? For example, someone well versed with old English literature may consider Shakespeare easy to understand, but I certainly wouldn't. I think "speaks clearly, easy to understand" are just as subjective as our notions of clean/idiomatic/readable code.

SergeAx 4y ago
Someone really well versed will have an understanding of how old English sounds for layperson. Also, we are discussing a situation when everyone is more or less fluent in a given [programming] language, and the probable culprit is just flexing their recently gained obscure expressions or constructing overcomplex one-liners.

ebiester 4y ago

Are you in Bangalore, Mississippi, or Edinburgh? All three can talk with those in the same accent and dialect easily but are going to labor when talking with each other. What happens when half of your code uses functional patterns and the other half imperative/OO?