22

I'm not being high and mighty but I wonder how come someone claims they have loads and loads of years of experience in software engineering and they cannot even write an English sentence with a space after each comma.

Comments
  • 4
    Because it isn't a requirement for an SE. Ditto for most engineers and scientists.
  • 0
    @iAmNaN but good coding style is a requirement, is it not?
  • 11
    @rantsauce Because whitespace doesn't matter in real programming languages. ;-)
  • 3
    Writing well formed English sentences does not equate to good coding. In fact, you don't even have to speak or write English to write good code.
  • 0
    @iAmNaN but sticking to a proper form is part of writing good code.

    Also, how come you don't need English and most popular programming languages use English keywords?
  • 3
    @Fast-Nop Python?

    EDIT: My mistake. You said "real programming languages". Sorry :)
  • 4
    @rantsauce knowledge of a programming language doesn't equate to a knowledge of English, or vice versa. There are plenty of coders who don't speak much or any English, but write great code. Language ability doesn't equal coding ability. There are plenty of languages that don't even use English. ARLOGO, Chinese C++, and Ezhil are some examples.
  • 2
    For the same reason not all coders are gamers. Not all coders are artists, and not all coders are musicians - I may have 2/3 of these.

    Yes there can be some overlap but there is no distinct correlation.

    Writing code and sticking to standards is one thing, and depending on the language those standards can change somewhat. Then you have personal preference coming into play which deviates away from the coding style guides for your language. Which creates a new standard for your code base / project.

    So at be end of the day, standards are not laws and people tend to not always follow them.
    But as long as the project is in a single style then what's it matter?
  • 1
    @iAmNaN Exactly. Maybe you can code in brainfuck but speak zero French. The two things have nothing to do with each other...
  • 1
    Adding a space after a comma is not exclusive to English
  • 1
    It's a data compression algorithm called notgivinafuck.
  • 1
    @broseph
    +[-[<<[+[--->]-[<<<]]]>>>-]>-.---.>..>.<<<<-.<+.>>>>>.>.<<.<-.
  • 0
    So, back to OP. Depending on how many years "loads and loads of years of experience" is, they would have learned to minimize spaces in their code, because disk space was extremely expensive, and so compact code was a must. Pretty code is a luxury we take for granted. Mustn't waste money on superfluous space usage. Having said that, there is still no correlation between writing English sentences and computer code.
  • 1
    @iAmNaN I’m gonna pretend like I even know how to compile that! 😃😃😂😂🤣
  • 0
    @Fast-Nop Then you call Python no real programming language?
  • 1
    @leduyquang753 If it's not C or Assembly, you're just faking it. 🙂
  • 0
    For those who are bored and want try it out, here is a brainfuck tutorial. It actually makes assembly look easy.
    https://gist.github.com/roachhd/...
  • 2
    You don't need to have great english skills to be a good programmer, but if you work somewhere where communication skills are crucial for development, and things you say or write down are ambiguous, then I don't think it would hurt to invest in reading/practicing some english on a daily basis to get better.

    It'll make your life a lot easier if you can communicate well with people around you.
  • 1
    I always saw lack of space as a typo, but one of my eternal crusades are people who use spaces BEFORE punctuation ! What's going on in your brain ?

    Lack of question marks gets me as well. That's where the discussion on professionalism ends and it actually starts to become an issue with interpretation.
  • 0
    @nanos No!
  • 0
    @ltlian

    "It was a rhetorical question"

    "?"
  • 0
    @leduyquang753 I personally don’t... because all the wanna be software engineers use it.. all those hipsters and script kittens no understanding of memory . Just use every api out there yep it’s bullshit... if your not using ASM, C or C++ ... all your doing is scripting really. No real sense of a physical product
Add Comment