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From: bobduff@world.std.com (Robert A Duff)
Subject: Re: Ada Readers (was Re: Coding Standards)
Date: 1996/06/20
Message-ID: <DtApAu.G1F@world.std.com>#1/1
X-Deja-AN: 161182393
references: <9606192024.AA12434@calstar3.lasc.lockheed.com>
organization: The World Public Access UNIX, Brookline, MA
newsgroups: comp.lang.ada
Date: 1996-06-20T00:00:00+00:00
List-Id: <comp.lang.ada>


In article <9606192024.AA12434@calstar3.lasc.lockheed.com>,
 <jbrooksh@CALSTAR3.LASC.LOCKHEED.COM> wrote:
>Robert A Duff <bobduff@WORLD.STD.COM> wrote:
>>What I don't understand is why we care so much about the READERS.  Only
>>the WRITERS can do damage.  ....
>
>I hope I haven't missed anything significant in this thread, but my
>perspective on "readers" of code is that of maintainers, and their
>understanding of the intention and implemetation of the code is crucial to
>their responsibility - keep the code real in all its future changing/expanding
>missions.

I think you're missing some context.  I agree completely with what you
say here.

In the context of my comment above, maintainers are WRITERS -- that is,
they can damage a program, because they modify it.  Of course, they read
it first, too.  My point was just that if somebody is going to read some
code BUT NOT MODIFY it, then I don't care so much whether that person
truly understands it, and if they don't, nobody would notice.  On the
other hand, if the person is reading it in order to understand how to
modify it, I care a *lot* whether they understand it properly.

- Bob