[self-follow-up] Hi Deri,
One more thing occurred to me, because your last paragraph was sticking in my mind and I think I figured out why. At 2024-02-06T19:30:58-0600, G. Branden Robinson wrote: > > I am quite sure there will be "bugs" in my code, it is fairly > > complex, but subjecting it to a "code review" without even running > > it to see if it does what it says on the box, is not helpful. > > I think you've pretty badly mistaken my perspective. One of the > reasons I stick my long nose into your code in this way is because I > don't worry that you won't produce correct results. You have an > established record of delivering solutions that work as advertised. That you put code review into scare quotes gave me a sort of belated pause. It finally dawned on me that you might be regarding my undertaking of such on your contributions as a form of insult. It emphatically is not! Some computer science luminary--unfortunately I cannot remember who at the moment--made the observation that programming languages chiefly exist so that human beings can communicate to each other about programming. (Maybe someone reading recollects who I mean.) If PLs were intended _solely_ for consumption by machines, we'd stick with machine language...or maybe assembly. At the places I have worked, and at sites like GitHub and GitLab where people manage things like pull requests and merge requests, it is not only common for people other than the code author to undertake code review before attempting to run it themselves, it is expected that they won't! Part of this is due to the cultural expectation that the author of code will have tested it. But another aspect is that humans are actually pretty bad at inferring (perfect) correctness from inspection of source code. We are indeed likely to assume that it does what is on the box. What code review is good for--and I think I said this recently on this list, but maybe it was someplace else--is for programmers to share expertise and problem-solving techniques with each other, and also to reinforce the team mentality that sustains successful software projects above the very small scale. So I would ask that you please try to adopt that perspective when a person perceptibly studies your, or anyone else's code. Not all code is worthy of study. The famous Lions book presenting the Sixth Edition Unix kernel was not an insult to Thompson and Ritchie, but a high form of flattery...and today that book stands as a monument in the field of operating systems research as an exposition of a successful, high-quality system. At the time time, everybody had gripes about the Unix kernel and some aspects of how it was written, and even designed. This is how we learn, individually and collectively. So, if I pay your code some scrutiny, it is not out of hauteur, but respect. I look at your code because I want to work with you. I'm appreciate what you've contributed to groff and am pleased by how well-received your efforts continue to be. Best regards, Branden
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