16 Aug
2007
16 Aug
'07
5:06 p.m.
Chuck Guzis wrote:
In an EETimes online article today, I read the
following paragraph:
"Among its other features, Morrison said COSA allows more dynamic
changes in software than traditional methods, enables fast pre-
empting of threads and brings a new level of traceability to
processes. It is also easier to debug because it does not use the
structures of nested if-then-else statements known as spaghetti code
popular in conventional programming languages."
Nested "IF-THEN-ELSE" is now spaghetti code? I'd always understood
the term to mean code with lots of conditional GOTO statements (In
FORTRAN, sprinkle in a bunch of computed and assigned GOTOs and
you're talking real pasta).
When did the meaning change? Was it when the GOTO statement was
pretty much deprecated in just about every modern programming
language? I can recall when "structured programming" was popularly
held to mean "no GOTOs".
I don't think the meaning has changed. I think the person who was
talking doesn't really know spaghetti code when he sees it. I draw the
line at computed GOTO. I wouldn't even consider conditional GOTO to be
"spaghetti".
Although, I might consider assembler code where every second instruction
is a jump to be spaghetti code.
Peace... Sridhar