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=-2.9 required=5.0 tests=BAYES_00,MAILING_LIST_MULTI autolearn=unavailable autolearn_force=no version=3.4.4 X-Google-Language: ENGLISH,ASCII-7-bit X-Google-Thread: 103376,54889de51045a215 X-Google-Attributes: gid103376,public X-Google-ArrivalTime: 2003-10-20 16:31:40 PST Path: archiver1.google.com!news2.google.com!news.maxwell.syr.edu!newsfeed.stueberl.de!teaser.fr!enst.fr!melchior!cuivre.fr.eu.org!melchior.frmug.org!not-for-mail From: "Alexandre E. Kopilovitch" Newsgroups: comp.lang.ada Subject: Re: += in ada Date: Tue, 21 Oct 2003 03:24:57 +0400 (MSD) Organization: Cuivre, Argent, Or Message-ID: References: <3F94332E.3010500@comcast.net> NNTP-Posting-Host: lovelace.ada-france.org Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii X-Trace: melchior.cuivre.fr.eu.org 1066692634 62427 80.67.180.195 (20 Oct 2003 23:30:34 GMT) X-Complaints-To: usenet@melchior.cuivre.fr.eu.org NNTP-Posting-Date: Mon, 20 Oct 2003 23:30:34 +0000 (UTC) To: comp.lang.ada@ada-france.org Return-Path: In-Reply-To: <3F94332E.3010500@comcast.net>; from "Robert I. Eachus" at Mon, 20 Oct 2003 19:11:07 GMT X-Mailer: Mail/@ [v2.44 MSDOS] X-Virus-Scanned: by amavisd-new-20030616-p5 (Debian) at ada-france.org X-BeenThere: comp.lang.ada@ada-france.org X-Mailman-Version: 2.1.2 Precedence: list List-Id: Gateway to the comp.lang.ada Usenet newsgroup List-Unsubscribe: , List-Post: List-Help: List-Subscribe: , Xref: archiver1.google.com comp.lang.ada:1231 Date: 2003-10-21T03:24:57+04:00 Robert I. Eachus wrote: > The > key issue was abstraction. Some programmers just couldn't get it. They > could generated decent code in C or assembler, but when it came to Ada, > they, like Joe, couldn't accept the idea of abstraction and information > hiding. There may have been some way to reach those programmers, but we > didn't find it. Anyone who gets information hiding tends to love Ada. Well, I don't like when information is hidden from me. But I certainly like to hide information from others, especially if I suspect that they will use that information in wrong way (for example, devaluating or even destroy it). And yes, as you may guess, I like to hide (or save -;) information from myself being in some improper state. So, I tolerate this concept. But this concept sometimes is (yes, really is) a powerful weapon in hands of fools. There are cases where some design is simply wrong because it hides too much information (making desired functionality impossible), and every attempt to correct it leads only to a lecture about importance of information hiding. That's trivial - they are so proud that they managed to hide some significant piece of information that they become unable to listen why this information is needed to other parts of the system. So, what I certainly dislike is the term "information hiding". It is no much better than infamous "total informational awareness" -;) . I like "information structuring", I agree with various boundaries and safety checkpoints, hierachies, access levels and rights, etc., etc., but not with simple and popular "hiding". Alexander Kopilovitch aek@vib.usr.pu.ru Saint-Petersburg Russia