Direction of KDevelop4

[Richard Dale]

On Monday 12 September 2005 22:38, Adam Treat wrote:
> On Monday September 12 2005 2:38 pm, Richard Dale wrote:
> > I agree with Jen's pragmatic replies.
>
> That's nice.
>
> > In the real world, programmers tend
> > to layout code according to their own taste, and there is no one right
> > way to write code.
>
> Nor did I -- in any way -- say otherwise.
You said there should be a single coding style for all of KDevelop.

> > As a professional programmer doing unpaid work on KDevelop,
> > I certainly don't appreciate being told how to write comments and layout
> > code.
>
> Lucky no one was telling you either one.
You said there should be a single coding style for all of KDevelop.

> Look, almost everyone agrees that some comments are useless:
>
> ///This is a class declaration for Foobar
> class Foobar
> {
>
> and almost everone agrees that, at least within an individual plugin,
> coding style should be consistent.
>
> Now, no matter how many times that the comments I'm talking about are in
> the form of the above ... no matter how many times I have shown specific
> examples of very important files in KDevelop where the coding style changes
> from method to method and line to line ...
Umm, yes. But then we have peer review of patches on a public mailing list to 
fix this kind of thing. The issue is whether or not the project is 
'under-managed' and we need to have more written rules, as opposed to the 
normal KDE processes which work so well on many other projects.

> You feel attacked.  Sorry.
No not at all, just patronised.

> > I didn't find any of the code the I've maintained in KDevelop
> > particularly hard to follow.
>
> Never said it was.
You said the code completion code/parser was an eyesore, and couldn't look at 
it until it had been reformatted.

> Anyway, I guess I'll have to go through and compile a list of the comments
> I'm talking about ... stuff like:
>
> //huh?
>
> Because obviously, that is a really useful comment.  Or how about:
>
> ////////////////////////////////
>
> ...just in the middle of some source for no particular reason.
There is no disagreement over whether or not there is such a thing as bad 
comments or bad code layout, only whether or not it is necessary to have 
written rules to tell people what to do. Derek Kite said in his recent 
interview that his father often would say that 'Experience can't be 
transmitted', and I think that very much applies here. You can't create a 
professional programmer by just writing a load of coding rules for them to 
follow on a single sheet of A4. The best way to get better is by having your 
code reviewed by people who are at least as good at programming as you are. 
And that is exactly what tends to happen on the KDE project, and that is why 
KDE is so successful.

-- Richard