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: 103376,1c1a139977eee854 X-Google-Attributes: gid103376,public X-Google-ArrivalTime: 2002-04-21 22:15:05 PST Path: archiver1.google.com!news1.google.com!newsfeed.stanford.edu!news-spur1.maxwell.syr.edu!news.maxwell.syr.edu!news.algonet.se!algonet!news000.worldonline.se!newsfeed01.nntp.se.dataphone.net!nntp.se.dataphone.net!feeder1.news.jippii.net!nntp.inet.fi!central.inet.fi!inet.fi!read2.inet.fi.POSTED!not-for-mail From: "Anders Wirzenius" Newsgroups: comp.lang.ada References: Subject: Re: Case statement and Integers. X-Newsreader: Microsoft Outlook Express 4.72.3110.5 X-MIMEOLE: Produced By Microsoft MimeOLE V4.72.3110.3 Message-ID: Date: Mon, 22 Apr 2002 05:14:51 GMT NNTP-Posting-Host: 194.251.142.2 X-Trace: read2.inet.fi 1019452491 194.251.142.2 (Mon, 22 Apr 2002 08:14:51 EET DST) NNTP-Posting-Date: Mon, 22 Apr 2002 08:14:51 EET DST Organization: Sonera corp Internet services Xref: archiver1.google.com comp.lang.ada:22882 Date: 2002-04-22T05:14:51+00:00 List-Id: tmoran@acm.org wrote in message ... > Bicycling to Hawaii is original - but it won't work either. In >Software Engineering, the point is to make something that works, not >necessarily something original. In fact, since you will abandon most of >your code to your maintenance successors (one hopes you move on to new >things!), and originality will just confuse them, originality itself is a >downright *negative* aspect of code, to be used only when the negative is >outweighed by the positive benefits of the novel technique. I think the main goal here is not to produce something that works. The goal is to learn a computer language. One very good way to learn is to do something in several different ways and concentrate on what the alternatives demand from the syntax or logic. Mr Wannabe h4x0r, please keep up being, as you say in an earlier posting, "crazy like that". Solve the problem, not in one way, not in two ways, no, do it in as many ways you may imagine. Compare the ways and watch your reaction to the different solutions. Then you may discover something very valuable about Ada. And of course, nothing prevents you from choosing the "winner code" that is most efficient, most readable, most maintainable... then you may discover something about Software Engineering. br Anders Wirzenius