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It was somewhat common in the 1970s and before for programming languages to support abbreviating variable names when you referenced them. So for example, you co
by tdeck 2y ago
It was somewhat common in the 1970s and before for programming languages to support abbreviating variable names when you referenced them. So for example, you could say
patients = 400
x = pat / 2
And x would be 200. This seems like an obvious footgun today and I don't think any language designer would even consider it, but it seemed to make sense for a while.
- TylerE 2y agoWere they actually supporting abbreviating or just doing something like only storing the first 3 characters of the name? That feels more like something a compiler trying to fit in 8k of RAM or whatever would do.
- lovich 2y agoIs there a difference between doing something and supporting something? This joke is like a decade old at this point https://xkcd.com/1172/ https://xkcd.com/1172/
- TylerE 2y agoWell, yes. Namely, what does the following code do? patients = 400 patents = 20 x = patients / 10 If the compiler truncates, x will be 2 (assuming it allows variable reassignment), and you've probably introduced at least two bugs. It's doing some sort of lookup against the source, well, all bets are really off.
- lovich 2y agoYou have ignored my question “Doing something” is the beginning of how to describe the actual truth of what some actions causes in relation to its affect on reality. “Supporting something” has literally nothing to do with reality beyond what’s necessary to support a brain that can _intend_ a result or action regardless of what actually happens. I linked the xkcd comic because the behavior described by the developer in the comic met the criteria for “doing something” but it didn’t meet the criteria for “supporting something” because the behavior of the software was not what the developer intended.