[Info-vax] openvms and xterm

[Arne Vajhøj]

On 5/3/2024 10:16 AM, Dave Froble wrote:
> On 5/3/2024 8:03 AM, chrisq wrote:
>>  Yes, it's the fashion
>> to write commentless code these days,
> 
> Since when?
> 
> If so, then things are worse than I could imagine.

I will claim that the "recommended approach"
today actually is to use comments.

Clean Code, Code Complete etc..

Note though that there is a strong focus on useful
comments vs useless comments.

Useless comments are comments that explains what
the code does, but if the reader knows the programming
language, then those are redundant because the code
already provide that information, and they are in fact
bad because they clutter up the code.

Useful comments are comments that explain why the code
does what it does.

Super simple example useless:

// add 1 to ix
ix = ix + 1

Super simple example useful:

// skip separating comma
ix = ix + 1

But "recommended approach" and "used everywhere" are
of course two different things.

In general the overall picture of software quality is
very mixed. Some good, a lot ok and some bad. Maybe
even a lot bad.

The number of software developers has increased x10 or more.
And no surprise the average skill level of 30 million
software developers are lower than than of 3 million software
developers.

Current fashions in development methodologies does not
favor strict processes.

There may also be a generational thing of "I will do as
I am told" vs "I will do as I want to".

So in the real world some write useless comments because
they don't know better, some write no comments because
they can get away with it and some write no comments
because the feel very cool by proclaiming that
"code should be self-explanatory".

And some still write useful comments because they got it.

Arne