From mboxrd@z Thu Jan 1 00:00:00 1970 X-Spam-Checker-Version: SpamAssassin 3.4.4 (2020-01-24) on polar.synack.me X-Spam-Level: X-Spam-Status: No, score=-1.9 required=5.0 tests=BAYES_00 autolearn=ham autolearn_force=no version=3.4.4 X-Google-Language: ENGLISH,ASCII-7-bit X-Google-Thread: 10ad19,23963231b5359f74 X-Google-Attributes: gid10ad19,public X-Google-Thread: 1073c2,23963231b5359f74 X-Google-Attributes: gid1073c2,public X-Google-Thread: 101deb,23963231b5359f74 X-Google-Attributes: gid101deb,public X-Google-Thread: 11440e,23963231b5359f74 X-Google-Attributes: gid11440e,public X-Google-Thread: 10a146,23963231b5359f74 X-Google-Attributes: gid10a146,public X-Google-Thread: 107a89,23963231b5359f74 X-Google-Attributes: gid107a89,public X-Google-Thread: 103376,23963231b5359f74 X-Google-Attributes: gid103376,public X-Google-ArrivalTime: 2001-05-24 22:52:01 PST Path: archiver1.google.com!newsfeed.google.com!sn-xit-03!supernews.com!cyclone-sjo1.usenetserver.com!news-out-sjo.usenetserver.com!e420r-sjo4.usenetserver.com!news-out.usenetserver.com!newshub2.rdc1.sfba.home.com!news.home.com!enews.sgi.com!csulb.edu!/news!news.fsu.edu!bellenot From: bellenot@math.fsu.edu (Steve Bellenot) Newsgroups: comp.lang.ruby,comp.lang.ada,comp.lang.awk,comp.lang.clarion,comp.lang.java.programmer,comp.lang.pl1,comp.lang.vrml Subject: Re: Long names are doom ? Date: 25 May 2001 05:42:26 GMT Organization: Florida State University Department of Mathematics Message-ID: <9ekrc2$hk0$1@news.fsu.edu> References: <3B0DBD4A.82943473@my-deja.net> NNTP-Posting-Host: newton.math.fsu.edu X-Trace: news.fsu.edu 990769346 18048 128.186.104.21 (25 May 2001 05:42:26 GMT) X-Complaints-To: abuse@fsu.edu NNTP-Posting-Date: 25 May 2001 05:42:26 GMT Xref: archiver1.google.com comp.lang.ruby:9880 comp.lang.ada:7746 comp.lang.awk:2584 comp.lang.clarion:20305 comp.lang.java.programmer:70588 comp.lang.pl1:628 comp.lang.vrml:3309 Date: 2001-05-25T05:42:26+00:00 List-Id: In article <3B0DBD4A.82943473@my-deja.net>, 00001111 <00001111@my-deja.net> wrote: > > Hi All, > > Anybody use variables/names longer than 31 character >and finds it really useful ? > >Then please respond why, where, when. >I have folks here in comp.lang.fortran who will die claiming that they > >- "never seen a well written, legible program > that uses any identifiers longer than 18-20 characters..". >- "long variables names are *hard* to read. And, you have to > read though all the characters of every instance of them...". >- "it degrades the legibility of a program to use identifiers that > can't be easily remembered...." > >As a result, despite 90% of computer languages have long, very >long or 'infinite' identifiers, fortran folks seems plan to stay >with their 6...aargh ...sorry this was just not far ago... 31 character >limit intil year 3000. While 31 is arbitrary and obviously ``wrong'' for not being 0, 1 or infinity, I must agree that identifiers longer that most Russian novels are worst. [Especially to those of us who have worked with people who indent 2 spaces at a time, use a 132 column editor and consider the whitespace as a goal to fill.] That is there must be some number n where the pain of seeing identifiers of length > n is worst than the pain of having to make all identifers have length <= n. It is more likely that the answer is 42, but it could be 31. -- http://www.math.fsu.edu/~bellenot bellenot math.fsu.edu +1.850.644.7189 (4053fax)