From mboxrd@z Thu Jan 1 00:00:00 1970 Path: news.gmane.org!not-for-mail From: Daniel Brockman Newsgroups: gmane.emacs.devel Subject: Re: constant `e' Date: Mon, 12 Feb 2007 20:57:09 +0100 Message-ID: <8764a76tey.fsf@wigwam.brockman.se> References: <87ireah6ia.fsf@wigwam.brockman.se> <854ppu8k1l.fsf@lola.goethe.zz> <87y7n6fdod.fsf@wigwam.brockman.se> <20070210135753.GB885@muc.de> <87ireaf5f1.fsf@wigwam.brockman.se> <45311.128.165.123.18.1171307030.squirrel@webmail.lanl.gov> NNTP-Posting-Host: lo.gmane.org Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii X-Trace: sea.gmane.org 1171310261 24547 80.91.229.12 (12 Feb 2007 19:57:41 GMT) X-Complaints-To: usenet@sea.gmane.org NNTP-Posting-Date: Mon, 12 Feb 2007 19:57:41 +0000 (UTC) To: emacs-devel@gnu.org Original-X-From: emacs-devel-bounces+ged-emacs-devel=m.gmane.org@gnu.org Mon Feb 12 20:57:35 2007 Return-path: Envelope-to: ged-emacs-devel@m.gmane.org Original-Received: from lists.gnu.org ([199.232.76.165]) by lo.gmane.org with esmtp (Exim 4.50) id 1HGhIp-000242-R9 for ged-emacs-devel@m.gmane.org; Mon, 12 Feb 2007 20:57:32 +0100 Original-Received: from localhost ([127.0.0.1] helo=lists.gnu.org) by lists.gnu.org with esmtp (Exim 4.43) id 1HGhIp-0001rZ-Hi for ged-emacs-devel@m.gmane.org; Mon, 12 Feb 2007 14:57:31 -0500 Original-Received: from mailman by lists.gnu.org with tmda-scanned (Exim 4.43) id 1HGhIf-0001rK-7G for emacs-devel@gnu.org; Mon, 12 Feb 2007 14:57:21 -0500 Original-Received: from exim by lists.gnu.org with spam-scanned (Exim 4.43) id 1HGhIc-0001r7-Mz for emacs-devel@gnu.org; Mon, 12 Feb 2007 14:57:19 -0500 Original-Received: from [199.232.76.173] (helo=monty-python.gnu.org) by lists.gnu.org with esmtp (Exim 4.43) id 1HGhIc-0001r4-IO for emacs-devel@gnu.org; Mon, 12 Feb 2007 14:57:18 -0500 Original-Received: from main.gmane.org ([80.91.229.2] helo=ciao.gmane.org) by monty-python.gnu.org with esmtps (TLS-1.0:RSA_AES_256_CBC_SHA:32) (Exim 4.52) id 1HGhIb-0007DM-NG for emacs-devel@gnu.org; Mon, 12 Feb 2007 14:57:18 -0500 Original-Received: from list by ciao.gmane.org with local (Exim 4.43) id 1HGhIX-00079O-M2 for emacs-devel@gnu.org; Mon, 12 Feb 2007 20:57:13 +0100 Original-Received: from c-a4fee255.09-32-6c6b7013.cust.bredbandsbolaget.se ([85.226.254.164]) by main.gmane.org with esmtp (Gmexim 0.1 (Debian)) id 1AlnuQ-0007hv-00 for ; Mon, 12 Feb 2007 20:57:13 +0100 Original-Received: from daniel by c-a4fee255.09-32-6c6b7013.cust.bredbandsbolaget.se with local (Gmexim 0.1 (Debian)) id 1AlnuQ-0007hv-00 for ; Mon, 12 Feb 2007 20:57:13 +0100 X-Injected-Via-Gmane: http://gmane.org/ Original-Lines: 78 Original-X-Complaints-To: usenet@sea.gmane.org X-Gmane-NNTP-Posting-Host: c-a4fee255.09-32-6c6b7013.cust.bredbandsbolaget.se X-Face: :&2UWGm>e24)ip~'K@iOsA&JT3JX*v@1-#L)=dUb825\Fwg#`^N!Y*g-TqdS AevzjFJe96f@V'ya8${57/T'"mTd`1o{TGYhHnVucLq!D$r2O{IN)7>.0op_Y`%r;/Q +(]`3F-t10N7NF\.Mm0q}p1:%iqTi:5]1E]rDF)R$9.!,Eu'9K':y9^U3F8UCS1M+A$ 8[[[WT^`$P[vu>P+8]aQMh9giu&fPCqLW2FSsGs User-Agent: Gnus/5.11 (Gnus v5.11) Emacs/23.0.51 (gnu/linux) Cancel-Lock: sha1:GpRDxsqNW3FNBT4HEs26DYO/R2g= X-detected-kernel: Linux 2.6, seldom 2.4 (older, 4) X-BeenThere: emacs-devel@gnu.org X-Mailman-Version: 2.1.5 Precedence: list List-Id: "Emacs development discussions." List-Unsubscribe: , List-Archive: List-Post: List-Help: List-Subscribe: , Original-Sender: emacs-devel-bounces+ged-emacs-devel=m.gmane.org@gnu.org Errors-To: emacs-devel-bounces+ged-emacs-devel=m.gmane.org@gnu.org Xref: news.gmane.org gmane.emacs.devel:66308 Archived-At: "Stuart D. Herring" writes: >> Hm! That's interesting. >> >> The concept of `non-nil' is very basic to me, so I do not >> have to filter anything out of `(not (null ...))', because >> it is already phrased the way I think about it. > > I have addressed this point more extensively in another mail, but let me > add in response to this particular sentence that the concept of `non-nil' > is so very basic to me that I do not need to see `(not (null ...))' to > know that it is applied by such forms as `cond'. fine i really don't need to see most punctuation or capitalization to understand english sentences the thing is that i _want_ to see it because i think it makes the prose look better it's like i know there should be a question mark after this sentence, so why not add one it won't be distacting because not only am i used to seing question marks --- i add missing ones mentally when i read >> I had no idea some people read it like that. >> >> Do you feel similarily talked down to when you see C code >> like the following? >> >> for (node = list->first; node != NULL; node = node->next) >> process (node); > > I don't feel talked-down-to as much as I feel inconvenienced by (if you'll > pardon the exaggeration) the ineffective prose of a novice. I compared `!= NULL' and `(not (null ...))' to punctuation. I guess, in a way, punctuation makes prose "ineffective". > The use of NULL when even the compiler merely sees 0 in > its stead serves no purpose in terms of type-safety, I never claimed it did. > and after resolving that mentally I also waste more time > noting that `!=0' does not affect the conditional value of > an integer or pointer. That's ridiculous. If you have to spend many brain cycles figuring out what `node != NULL' means, I would hesitate to say that you are fluent in common idiomatic C. It's sort of comparable to stopping every time you see the word `but' and noting that, in fact, it just means `and'. > Although it would be clumsy here, I would even recommend, since the loop > is so simple, that a trivial loop over argv be written as > > for(ptr=argv;*ptr;process(*ptr++)); Well, I guess we'll just have to agree to disagree, because I think that's very hard to read. I would write it as follows: for (current = argv; *current != NULL; ++current) process (*current); Maybe we just speak different dialects of C or something. I speak "verbose" and you speak "cryptic". :-) -- Daniel Brockman