On Wednesday, 3 December 2014 at 19:42:39 UTC, Ary Borenszweig
wrote:
On 12/2/14, 6:41 PM, Vladimir Panteleev wrote:
Enter DCaptcha
I think this could work with just two or three variants of a
question. Always ask what's the return value of the function.
1. int foo() { return 8 % 3; }
I don't think non-programmers know what that '%' symbol is, but
programmers of any language would recognize this.
2. int foo() { int x = 8; x++; x++; return x; }
I don't think non-programmers would guess ++ is increment, but
programmers most probably know it.
3. bool foo() { return 42 != 30 };
I don't think non-programmers know what "!=" is.
I had to maintain a technical forum last year that was getting
spammed like crazy. I added the question "how many bits are in a
byte?", and the spam vanished. Based on that experience, I think
the bar can be set very low.
I prefer something like the examples above. Honestly, I don't
know what the names of many syntax features are, but I usually
know how to use and interpret them. But, one positive side
effect of this is that if I ever do get challenged with a "what
is the name of this feature?" question, I will finally be
motivated to go look it up.
Mike
