Sat, 30 Aug 2003 19:22:56 GMT

Code reading and literary criticism. Brian Marick has posted a wonderful essay on the subject of commenting code. “I do believe that code with comments should often be written to be more self-explanatory,” he says. “But code can only ever be self-explanatory with respect to an expected reader.” To illustrate, he shows an algorithm in C, then translates to the kind of Lisp a C programmer would write, then retranslates to the kind of Lisp a Lisp programmer would write. Then he walks through the Lisp code line by line, exploring how the code itself sets up and then satisfies expectations in the mind of a reader who is presumed Lisp-proficient.
… [Jon's Radio]

this actually tails in with some of what i'm arguing in my dissertation… i/m saving a copy.