[COFF] [SPAM] Re: [TUHS] Algol 68 and Unix (was cron and at ...)

[Clem Cole]

Excellent!
ᐧ

On Fri, Dec 18, 2020 at 9:43 AM Larry McVoy <lm at mcvoy.com> wrote:

> On Thu, Dec 17, 2020 at 04:10:03PM -0500, Clem Cole wrote:
> > On Thu, Dec 17, 2020 at 1:00 PM Larry McVoy <lm at mcvoy.com> wrote:
> >
> > > I think it is part of being really smart, it's a puzzle for them and
> they
> > > "win" if they can do something clever.  I always replied "It is write
> once,
> > > read many.  Optimize for reads".
> > >
> > Amen to that bro.
> >
> > As a side note, I will say there is another vector to this same curse.
> > It's the new guy coming into the project and deciding what is there is
> > crap, they can not understand and they can do a better job.
>
> Source management to the rescue.  I hired an extremely smart guy (he
> reads papers on string theory, the physics ones, for fun).  Taught him
> how to use our tools.  Gave him a bug to fix.  He looks at the source
> file and goes "This is crap, I'm gonna rewrite it so it is clean".
> Then remembers I showed him how he could see how the file evolved.
> So he looks at the first version of the file.  It is *exactly* what he
> was going to write.  Huh.  He starts going through the history.  Oh,
> this wart is for IRIX.  This wart is for windows 2000 that reuses PIDs
> right away.  This wart is for NFS.  Etc.
>
> In the end, he added another wart to fix the bug and left the file alone.
> I did say he was smart.
>
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