The Story So Far...
The Story So Far...
Posted Dec 29, 2014 9:39 UTC (Mon) by itvirta (guest, #49997)In reply to: The Story So Far... by ldo
Parent article: The "too small to fail" memory-allocation rule
>which has somehow baked itself into many parts of the Linux kernel since long before anyone can now remember.
About errors promised, but not returned, and the numerous error paths that are untested
because of that (plus a nice lock-up), if I got it right. The actual coding style of the error
paths seems unrelated.
> Yet, when challenged, they are unable to actually prove their point, by offering simpler
> alternatives to my code.
> So they resort to trying to cast aspersions on the quality of my code.
You've repeated about five times the suggestion that someone _else_ should prove their
way by reorganising _your_ code. Given that everyone else, including the Linux kernel folks
seem to be happy with their gotos against your suggestion, it seems that the numbers are
against you, and I've seen no proof for your way other than your personal (and persistent)
assertion.
Not that mere numbers prove everything, but it makes one wonder. As does the fact that
someone tried to rework your code, but made mistakes. Doesn't that also reflect badly on your
code? Perhaps it isn't as well-readable as you assert? Some specific issues about the coding
style have been mentioned, but I haven't seen any real arguments to defend them, except the
dogmatic anti-goto attitude. (And you accuse others of prejudice!)
I stumbled upon a rather apt quote attributed to Dijkstra regarding his well-known article
about not using goto. Perhaps you should ponder on it for a moment:
"I have the uncomfortable feeling that others are making a religion out of it, as if the conceptual
problems of programming could be solved by a single trick, by a simple form of coding discipline!"
> But that just brings us back to the same point: if they think my code is too complicated or just
> plain crap, why can’t they do better? Why can they not come up with something simpler to solve
> the same real-world problem? But they cannot.
If this is just an exercise, perhaps a smaller one would do. Also of course, you could do your
part in comparing the options. It's not like anyone has a responsibility to attend to exercises
someone else gives on the Internet. If you want to take the lack of submissions as proof of
your superior position, you are of course free to do so. But it doesn't mean you are right,
or that others will want to talk to you after that.
Somehow, I'm starting to hope you are just trolling. That would at least _explain_ all of this. :)
Posted Dec 30, 2014 21:00 UTC (Tue)
by ldo (guest, #40946)
[Link] (4 responses)
It is the complex cases that demonstrate the scalability of my technique over GOTOs. This is evidenced by the fact that no one can come up with an equivalent using GOTOs that is even correct.
Posted Dec 30, 2014 22:56 UTC (Tue)
by cesarb (subscriber, #6266)
[Link] (3 responses)
Absence of evidence is not evidence of absence.
You posted a large block of source code, without any testcases, written in an unorthodox coding style. To do a decent rewrite, first one would have to understand the code, which is made harder by the uncommon code style and by the fact that it's a mathematical algorithm; experienced programmers tend to "pattern match" the source code visually to skip unimportant details, but this can only happen if one is familiar with the coding style. Then one would have to carefully reformat each function, converting the do-nothing loops into straight code without breaking the do-something loops; this is made harder because the same keyword (break) is being used to exit both. Finally, one would have to refactor the code into a more traditional style, being very careful to not break anything (since there are no testcases).
That's a lot of work for something which would be used solely to score a rhetorical point and then thrown away; the maintainer of the code (you) would not accept the changed code, since you're being so dogmatic about your coding style.
It could be worth doing the exercise if there was any chance that it would not be a wasted effort. Since there isn't, there are better uses for our time, and that's probably why nobody's bothering.
Posted Dec 31, 2014 21:01 UTC (Wed)
by ldo (guest, #40946)
[Link] (2 responses)
Posted Dec 31, 2014 22:25 UTC (Wed)
by bronson (subscriber, #4806)
[Link] (1 responses)
Posted Jan 1, 2015 21:46 UTC (Thu)
by ldo (guest, #40946)
[Link]
Re: If this is just an exercise, perhaps a smaller one would do
Re: If this is just an exercise, perhaps a smaller one would do
*Yawn* More content-free hand-waving hot air. Show us the code!
Re: Absence of evidence is not evidence of absence.
Re: Absence of evidence is not evidence of absence.
Because they’re just not that interesting.
Re: why don't you rewrite the goto-laden kernel examples cesarb posted?