3 ms·

> Whst is this bit of code doing? This only applies to bad code. A formal programmic language beats an informal language anytime. Why on earth would you transl

by frevib 2mo ago

> Whst is this bit of code doing? This only applies to bad code. A formal programmic language beats an informal language anytime. Why on earth would you translate an unambiguous formal language to English? > Is there a risk of data leaking here? > Are permissions enforced downstream of this function? If you trust AI to give you that answer, you are going to run into serious issues.

raincole 2mo ago
> Why on earth would you translate an unambiguous formal language to English? Why on earth are all the books about programming, science and math written in English (and other natural languages) instead of a formal one then? Why on earth did comments even got invented?
dghlsakjg 2mo ago
A formal programmic language beats an informal language anytime. Why on earth would you write a comment in an ambiguous informal language when you could translate it to code?
- bryanrasmussen 2mo ago
  programmer looks at formal programmic language which has so beaten the informal language that one cannot tell the reason why this stupid bit of code exists in the silly form it does is to prevent an edge condition in a particular browser while still working fine for other browsers. Luckily genius programmer who understands formal programmic language and does not need weak comments to clarify why the world is not perfect, fixes the stupid looking code to be beautiful, opening company up to some really super neat, seemingly random bugs in one browser that nobody will understand for several months. tldr: one important reason comments exist is to clarify why code you might expect to look another way looks the way it does, of course if the only reason it looks the way it does is this is the way the AI wrote it I guess I agree the comment is unnecessary.
  - dghlsakjg 2mo ago
    I think you missed the joke. I wasn’t talking about code comments, but why this commenter who professed the superiority of formal languages could only get his argument across in an informal language.
    - bryanrasmussen 2mo ago
      Oh, sorry, I'm used to that exact argument that self-describing code is superior to comments, and it drives me up the wall.

by frevib 2mo ago

raincole 2mo ago

> Why on earth would you translate an unambiguous formal language to English? Why on earth are all the books about programming, science and math written in English (and other natural languages) instead of a formal one then? Why on earth did comments even got invented?

dghlsakjg 2mo ago

A formal programmic language beats an informal language anytime. Why on earth would you write a comment in an ambiguous informal language when you could translate it to code?

bryanrasmussen 2mo ago
programmer looks at formal programmic language which has so beaten the informal language that one cannot tell the reason why this stupid bit of code exists in the silly form it does is to prevent an edge condition in a particular browser while still working fine for other browsers. Luckily genius programmer who understands formal programmic language and does not need weak comments to clarify why the world is not perfect, fixes the stupid looking code to be beautiful, opening company up to some really super neat, seemingly random bugs in one browser that nobody will understand for several months. tldr: one important reason comments exist is to clarify why code you might expect to look another way looks the way it does, of course if the only reason it looks the way it does is this is the way the AI wrote it I guess I agree the comment is unnecessary.
- dghlsakjg 2mo ago
  I think you missed the joke. I wasn’t talking about code comments, but why this commenter who professed the superiority of formal languages could only get his argument across in an informal language.
  - bryanrasmussen 2mo ago
    Oh, sorry, I'm used to that exact argument that self-describing code is superior to comments, and it drives me up the wall.