Groups | Search | Server Info | Keyboard shortcuts | Login | Register [http] [https] [nntp] [nntps]

Groups > comp.lang.forth > #34326

Re: Does Forth solve the paradox?

From anton@mips.complang.tuwien.ac.at (Anton Ertl)
Newsgroups comp.lang.forth
Subject Re: Does Forth solve the paradox?
Date 2014-11-06 09:22 +0000
Organization Institut fuer Computersprachen, Technische Universitaet Wien
Message-ID <2014Nov6.102256@mips.complang.tuwien.ac.at> (permalink)
References <6f36e5e5-037c-41e2-89c5-2bc11937ddcd@googlegroups.com> <545a7e77$0$15893$e4fe514c@dreader35.news.xs4all.nl>

Show all headers | View raw

albert@spenarnc.xs4all.nl (Albert van der Horst) writes:
>In article <6f36e5e5-037c-41e2-89c5-2bc11937ddcd@googlegroups.com>,
> <forthisit@gmail.com> wrote:
>>http://www.informit.com/articles/article.aspx?p=1963779
[...]
>This article reminds me of when I was a high school student and was obliged
>to write essays about subjects. Of course I was naive and had no opinion
>whatsoever about the subjects, even less personal experience.

I also got the feeling of buzzword bingo from the article, like much
software engineering stuff around, but there are apparently some
points worth discussing there:

>But in the spirit of
>Halloween I'll drive a wooden stake through the heart.
>
>Flexibility breeds complexity?
>
>No!
>
>Simplicity breads flexibility.

Now that's an interesting point.  Looking at the descriptions of Chuck
Moore's philosophy (often called the Forth philosophy), he seems to
side with the author of the article: "Do not put code in your program
that might be used. Do not leave hooks on which you can hang
extensions."  These things he avoids are things that make the program
flexible.  And Chuck Moore does not want flexibility.  If the
requirements change and the program is not flexible enough, he does
not change the program, he rewrites it.

Sure, there are also cases where a simple solution is more flexible
than, say, a solution that is tightly optimized for a specific
application szenario; but in this example there is a third issue at
work that apparently took precedence over simplicity and flexibility.
Nobody will choose a complex and inflexible solution if they see a
simple and flexible one, unless the complex and inflexible solution
gives another, more important benefit.

- anton
-- 
M. Anton Ertl  http://www.complang.tuwien.ac.at/anton/home.html
comp.lang.forth FAQs: http://www.complang.tuwien.ac.at/forth/faq/toc.html
     New standard: http://www.forth200x.org/forth200x.html
   EuroForth 2014: http://www.euroforth.org/ef14/

Back to comp.lang.forth | Previous | Next — Previous in thread | Next in thread | Find similar | Unroll thread

Thread

Does Forth solve the paradox? forthisit@gmail.com - 2014-11-05 08:08 -0800
  Re: Does Forth solve the paradox? albert@spenarnc.xs4all.nl (Albert van der Horst) - 2014-11-05 19:45 +0000
    Re: Does Forth solve the paradox? "Elizabeth D. Rather" <erather@forth.com> - 2014-11-05 10:43 -1000
      Re: Does Forth solve the paradox? Paul Rubin <no.email@nospam.invalid> - 2014-11-05 14:04 -0800
        Re: Does Forth solve the paradox? "Elizabeth D. Rather" <erather@forth.com> - 2014-11-05 12:49 -1000
          Re: Does Forth solve the paradox? rickman <gnuarm@gmail.com> - 2014-11-05 18:13 -0500
            Re: Does Forth solve the paradox? "Elizabeth D. Rather" <erather@forth.com> - 2014-11-05 13:54 -1000
            Re: Does Forth solve the paradox? albert@spenarnc.xs4all.nl (Albert van der Horst) - 2014-11-06 10:13 +0000
          Re: Does Forth solve the paradox? the_gavino_himself <visphatesjava@gmail.com> - 2014-11-05 20:55 -0800
          Re: Does Forth solve the paradox? Paul Rubin <no.email@nospam.invalid> - 2014-11-05 22:19 -0800
      Re: Does Forth solve the paradox? m.a.m.hendrix@tue.nl - 2014-11-06 03:05 -0800
        Re: Does Forth solve the paradox? anton@mips.complang.tuwien.ac.at (Anton Ertl) - 2014-11-06 11:43 +0000
          Re: Does Forth solve the paradox? m.a.m.hendrix@tue.nl - 2014-11-06 04:46 -0800
            Re: Does Forth solve the paradox? anton@mips.complang.tuwien.ac.at (Anton Ertl) - 2014-11-06 16:58 +0000
    Re: Does Forth solve the paradox? rickman <gnuarm@gmail.com> - 2014-11-05 17:22 -0500
    Re: Does Forth solve the paradox? the_gavino_himself <visphatesjava@gmail.com> - 2014-11-05 18:54 -0800
    Re: Does Forth solve the paradox? anton@mips.complang.tuwien.ac.at (Anton Ertl) - 2014-11-06 09:22 +0000
      Re: Does Forth solve the paradox? Mark Wills <markwills1970@gmail.com> - 2014-11-06 03:20 -0800
      Re: Does Forth solve the paradox? Andrew Haley <andrew29@littlepinkcloud.invalid> - 2014-11-06 10:18 -0600
        Re: Does Forth solve the paradox? albert@spenarnc.xs4all.nl (Albert van der Horst) - 2014-11-06 18:30 +0000
          Re: Does Forth solve the paradox? Andrew Haley <andrew29@littlepinkcloud.invalid> - 2014-11-07 03:22 -0600
        Re: Does Forth solve the paradox? "Rod Pemberton" <buzzoff@nonamewhichexists.cmm> - 2014-11-06 16:57 -0500
          Re: Does Forth solve the paradox? forthisit@gmail.com - 2014-11-06 14:38 -0800
          Re: Does Forth solve the paradox? "Elizabeth D. Rather" <erather@forth.com> - 2014-11-06 13:58 -1000
        Re: Does Forth solve the paradox? Paul Rubin <no.email@nospam.invalid> - 2014-11-07 10:40 -0800
          Re: Does Forth solve the paradox? Andrew Haley <andrew29@littlepinkcloud.invalid> - 2014-11-08 02:36 -0600
          Re: Does Forth solve the paradox? "Elizabeth D. Rather" <erather@forth.com> - 2014-11-07 22:45 -1000
        Re: Does Forth solve the paradox? Bernd Paysan <bernd.paysan@gmx.de> - 2014-11-14 01:33 +0100
          Re: Does Forth solve the paradox? m.a.m.hendrix@tue.nl - 2014-11-14 02:34 -0800
          Re: Does Forth solve the paradox? Andrew Haley <andrew29@littlepinkcloud.invalid> - 2014-11-14 05:07 -0600
            Re: Does Forth solve the paradox? anton@mips.complang.tuwien.ac.at (Anton Ertl) - 2014-11-15 16:21 +0000
              Re: Does Forth solve the paradox? Andrew Haley <andrew29@littlepinkcloud.invalid> - 2014-11-15 11:52 -0600
              Re: Does Forth solve the paradox? hughaguilar96@yahoo.com - 2014-11-15 12:47 -0800
              Re: Does Forth solve the paradox? albert@spenarnc.xs4all.nl (Albert van der Horst) - 2014-11-16 00:06 +0000
                Re: Does Forth solve the paradox? Paul E Bennett <Paul_E.Bennett@topmail.co.uk> - 2014-11-16 00:45 +0000
                Re: Does Forth solve the paradox? albert@spenarnc.xs4all.nl (Albert van der Horst) - 2014-11-16 13:39 +0000
      Re: Does Forth solve the paradox? Paul E Bennett <Paul_E.Bennett@topmail.co.uk> - 2014-11-06 19:54 +0000
  Re: Does Forth solve the paradox? Ilya Tarasov <ilya74.tarasov@gmail.com> - 2014-11-06 08:26 -0800
    Re: Does Forth solve the paradox? "Rod Pemberton" <buzzoff@nonamewhichexists.cmm> - 2014-11-06 16:57 -0500

csiph-web