Re: Language Choice and Coding style

[dewar@cs.nyu.edu (Robert Dewar)]

Jeff said

"Your CM system's difference utility will.  Quite often the fastest
way to find where a newly introduced bug is hiding is to run some
sort of diff across the revision that introduced it.  I'd hesitate
to lose that ability in exchange for the minimal benefit of allowing
programmers to waste their time futzing around with braces."

(talking about the use of formatting editors to allow programmers to follow
their own tastes in formatting).

Yes, indeed. And why in any case do we consider the use of formatting
editors -- just to allow programmers to follow their own idiosyncratic
tastes in formatting?

But (a) this is of no value, there is no point in indulging idiosyncrasy
unless there is some definite technical advantage in doing so, and none
can be claimed for simple formatting issues.

More importantly, (b) if programmers can't even agree to use a common
standard for trivial formatting issues, you have on your hands the kind
of personality that just does not like conformity and consistency. We
have certainly seen that personality displayed by a few people here. If
you have someone like that, then, much more seriously than not indenting
right, they are likely to fight against conformity to much more important
requirements for consistent standards at the design level.

People who insist on coding in their own style should stick to one person
projects in my opinion. Consistency and conformity at *all* levels of
a program, ranging from the simplest formatting issues to fundamental
design structure, is an absolute requirement in multi-person projects.