Interview with Donald Knuth

http://www.informit.com/articles/article.aspx?p=1193856#.Uy2YbrdYFCs.hackernews

by cab1729 • 12 years ago

2 2 12 years ago

informit.com

jeremysmyth• 12 years ago

From 2008.

zapman449• 12 years ago

Can I say "thank you" about his point on reusable code? Re-editable code as he puts it is far more useful.

Witness in puppet: their 'go to' module for example purposes is for ntp. Yet, last I looked, their ntp module contained a couple thousand lines of complex puppet logic to handle every configuration option under the sun. In making a meta configuration language, they have made a hydra of maintain-ability, in the name of re usability.

Far better in my view is a straightforward example that interested parties can take and tweak to their needs. Some need an iteratable list of ntp servers, some need a local clock skew.

Almost all ntp server environments can get by with a 20-30 line config file. Don't maintain a thousand+ line monster to maintain it in a reusable manner.

And now up the complexity to, say, tomcat. How complex would a fully flexible tomcat module have to be? Now do the same for Nginx. It's a pipe dream of combinatorial explosion.

Interview with Donald Knuth

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