Re: short-circuit control forms (& 'long names are doom')

[Charles Hixson <charleshixson@earthling.net>]

Long Names:  I tend to avoid long names, as long as I can come 
up with a suitable short name.  str_ptr has no need to be 
renamed into String_Pointer.  In fact, usually sPtr would be 
quite clear in context.  And compact code that is clear is 
easier to debug than verbose code that says exactly the same 
thing.
But don't forget the caveat.  If the name isn't clear, then it 
needs to be longer.  Or perhaps just totally redesigned.  (And 
when figuring out what is clear, have pity on the maintenance.)

Short-Cut Booleans:  Sometimes these are mandatory.  They rarely 
do harm in current code.  But they may limit the optimization 
that will be possible in the future.  I can quite imagine a 
compiler that decides that a multi-processor should run the 
logic tests in parallel, unless they were simple expressions or 
short-cut forms.  And in a few years, this may be significant.  
OTOH, short-cut forms make the code more deterministic, so 
perhaps another kind of optimization becomes easier.  And they 
should make correctness proofs easier (fewer paths to examine).

I generally only use short-cut booleans where they are needed.

-- 
Charles Hixson

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