Programming language failings [was Re: strangest systems I've sent email from]

[Chuck Guzis]

On 04/29/2016 11:59 AM, Ian S. King wrote:
> 
> Don't blame the tools - blame an educational system that doesn't
> teach software engineering practice, but just teaches tools.  "Hey,
> hold my beer and watch this!"  -- Ian

Maybe--I can't say.   At a very early stage in my career, I was exposed
to "coding standards" as well as "code review".  I took great pride in
that few reviewers had any quibbles with my code.  Those coding
standards extended to the type of commentary required as well as the
convention for naming routines, variables and labels.  It was
anticipated that commentary for a routine could be automatically
extracted and be close to what was expected for an internal maintenance
document.   Do it enough and it becomes a habit for life.

This is from when assembly was the language of the day.

I've run across old programs that I found myself marveling at for the
clarity and discipline of coding, only to find that it was some program
that I'd forgotten that I'd written did 30 years before.

But all that was in the day of punched cards and printed listings and
red pencils.

I don't know what people do now.

--Chuck