Code, women do it better
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[Quote]In an effort to make Ingres’s computer code more user-friendly and gender-neutral, McGrattan helped institute new coding standards at the company. They require programmers to include a detailed set of comments before each block of code explaining what the piece of code does and why; developers also must supply a detailed history of any changes they have made to the code. The rules apply to both Ingres employees and members of the open-source community who contribute code to Ingres’s products.[/Quote] Yup - I've used Ingres' database - it's one of the nastiest pieces of database technology that it's ever been my misfortune to touch. While other database manufacturers actually went about making their databases more powerful and useful, Ingres is better commented. :rolleyes:
Deja View - the feeling that you've seen this post before.
Cool, I have never in my 14 year career have ever talked or seen someone use Ingres professionally.
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Let's not diss them too much though. They're just so much nicer to errm, cuddle.... (I'll let you replace the word with the physical action of your choice). Let's face it, for all their naive statements about comments and the like, they are a better choice than the alternative.
Deja View - the feeling that you've seen this post before.
There are no books like a dame, And nothin' looks like a dame. There are no drinks like a dame, And nothin' thinks like a dame, Nothin' acts like a dame, Or attracts like a dame. There ain't a thing that's wrong with any man here That can't be cured by puttin' him near A girly, womanly, female, feminine dame!
Jon Smith & Wesson: The original point and click interface
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Let's not diss them too much though. They're just so much nicer to errm, cuddle.... (I'll let you replace the word with the physical action of your choice). Let's face it, for all their naive statements about comments and the like, they are a better choice than the alternative.
Deja View - the feeling that you've seen this post before.
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Having it in source control is all fine and dandy, but when you've retrieved code from source control and you're scanning through it in the IDE, it's really nice to have those coding standards in place. That's the way I like to comment my code - especially when you're in a team of programmers.
"Why don't you tie a kerosene-soaked rag around your ankles so the ants won't climb up and eat your candy ass..." - Dale Earnhardt, 1997
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"...the staggering layers of obscenity in your statement make it a work of art on so many levels." - Jason Jystad, 10/26/2001Does anyone actually read/make the check in comments. I have yet to see a single comment (I may have ignored it). Got to comment the code, even if for a single dev, many times I have you looked at old code and wondered what the hell it was supposed to do. And it gets worse when there is a team of dev creating/supporting the code.
Never underestimate the power of human stupidity RAH
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You do change history in comments?
regards, Paul Watson Ireland & South Africa
Fernando A. Gomez F. wrote:
At least he achieved immortality for a few years.
Damn right I do - I want the history and the reasoning right there with the code!
Never underestimate the power of human stupidity RAH
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//10.29.2008 The shoes didn't fit well so i had to return them. But it like totally worked out //because now they had the green ones in stock.. they are sooo amazing //oh and added a check for null
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What is that “comments” stuff? I’m hearing some mates mention this time to time through the last decade, so I’m become curious. Some new technology or just a abbreviation of COM driving ME NuTS? :confused:
The narrow specialist in the broad sense of the word is a complete idiot in the narrow sense of the word.
COM driving ME NuTS... Best reply ever :) I had a pretty good laugh from that
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That post was very east to understand. Put more effort in next time eh ;) (typing this on an iPhone... Very hard... Hope it is incomprehensible to read...)
regards, Paul Watson Ireland & South Africa
Fernando A. Gomez F. wrote:
At least he achieved immortality for a few years.
Paul Watson wrote:
(typing this on an iPhone... Very hard...
I thought any product whose name begins with a lower case 'i' was supposed to be easy! :-D
Christopher Duncan Author of The Career Programmer and Unite the Tribes www.PracticalUSA.com
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You do change history in comments?
regards, Paul Watson Ireland & South Africa
Fernando A. Gomez F. wrote:
At least he achieved immortality for a few years.
Yep, almost always.
"Why don't you tie a kerosene-soaked rag around your ankles so the ants won't climb up and eat your candy ass..." - Dale Earnhardt, 1997
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"...the staggering layers of obscenity in your statement make it a work of art on so many levels." - Jason Jystad, 10/26/2001 -
I find that anyone who assigns an ethnicity, or gender classification to subject matter that are totally unrelated, suspect, anything they write I therefore discounted. examples of stupidity; Hey you are black, you can dance... All white women are molleys[^]... All Jews are good at accounting... ... I bet you can't fool ole Rebecca Buckman, when she walks into a room, I bet she immediately knows if you are black, white, man, are a women and she's got you all figured out and what your capabilities are. [modified added link to what a molley is /]
MrPlankton
modified on Saturday, June 7, 2008 8:48 AM
That reminds me of a very funny roll call on a parade ground, many years ago. The Regimental Sergeant Major, as he prepared to call roll, said (roughly translated from Afrikaans), "And please tell me if you're a woman when you answer." :laugh:
Semicolons: The number one seller of ostomy bags world wide. - dan neely
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new coding standards at the company. They require programmers to include a detailed set of comments before each block of code explaining what the piece of code does and why; developers also must supply a detailed history of any changes they have made to the code.
I am going to pretty much validate what this article says[^] but that is one horrible coding standard, in my humble opinion. The "change history" bit is particularly nasty. We have source control and commit comments for that.
regards, Paul Watson Ireland & South Africa
Fernando A. Gomez F. wrote:
At least he achieved immortality for a few years.
I think it's a simple reflection of the relatively few women in our industry and the struggle they've had to be accepted. Those who aim to enter the profession are more motivated to be good developers, and those who are good developers are more motivated to carry on in the face of discrimination. So I think the mean level of female programmers is likely to be higher than that of male programmers, and the spread of ability is likely to be tighter too. Basically we've got a lot of very bad male programmers simply because there's a lot of demand for programming and clients will take any programmer over none (although in some cases they'd have been better off with none). 'Mercenary' students, interested in the profession only because they thought they'd make lots of money, were a real problem in the dot.com boom, but they're still out there and some of them are getting jobs just because there's no-one else. If the male/female balance is improved, I suspect you're likely to see reversion to the norm: equally poor male and female programmers, unless the demand for programming as a whole drops. (Reversion to the mean is the most common outcome whenever you observe some outlier, whether it's the sex of children of fighter pilots or supposed ESP abilities). I'd love to be proved wrong though.
DoEvents: Generating unexpected recursion since 1991
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From knowing other women, it doesn't matter if they fit or not. If they look cute they'll shove their feet into them.
My oh my. http://craptasticnation.blogspot.com/[^]
Kinda like guys, if they look cute we'll shove our... oh never mind :rolleyes:
¡El diablo está en mis pantalones! ¡Mire, mire! Real Mentats use only 100% pure, unfooled around with Sapho Juice(tm)! SELECT * FROM User WHERE Clue > 0 0 rows returned Save an Orange - Use the VCF! VCF Blog
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new coding standards at the company. They require programmers to include a detailed set of comments before each block of code explaining what the piece of code does and why; developers also must supply a detailed history of any changes they have made to the code.
I am going to pretty much validate what this article says[^] but that is one horrible coding standard, in my humble opinion. The "change history" bit is particularly nasty. We have source control and commit comments for that.
regards, Paul Watson Ireland & South Africa
Fernando A. Gomez F. wrote:
At least he achieved immortality for a few years.
Paul Watson wrote:
The "change history" bit is particularly nasty. We have source control and commit comments for that.
That's something that's mandated for safety-critical code in the company I work for. It can be useful for when you need to look at code and are working disconnected (like 30000 feet up in a plane), and as the SCM tool adds it in when you use appropriate keywords, it's a no-brainer. Personally, I find fnction-level comments in code of limited use without reasonable design documentation that helps you navigate around the module level (or higher) of code. I like to be able to get a good overview of how the complete code-base fits together before diving into source.
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I find that anyone who assigns an ethnicity, or gender classification to subject matter that are totally unrelated, suspect, anything they write I therefore discounted. examples of stupidity; Hey you are black, you can dance... All white women are molleys[^]... All Jews are good at accounting... ... I bet you can't fool ole Rebecca Buckman, when she walks into a room, I bet she immediately knows if you are black, white, man, are a women and she's got you all figured out and what your capabilities are. [modified added link to what a molley is /]
MrPlankton
modified on Saturday, June 7, 2008 8:48 AM
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I wanted to reply to that, but I couldn't decide between 1) pleading to not lose man points, and 2) :grabs crotch: <New York Accent> I got your man points right here! </New York Accent> so I decided not to.
BDF A learned fool is more a fool than an ignorant fool. -- Moliere
Big Daddy Farang wrote:
:grabs crotch: I got your man points right here!
Be careful whose crotch you are grabbing ... :)
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