• Shambo (unregistered)

    where is the spec?

  • (cs)

    Whilst you are posting these things before 7:00 AM (central time), how am I ever going to be fist?

    Answer: plan to stay home sick, and log on here instead of getting dressed. Whilst I do this, I may at least be fecund, if not fist.

  • Belcat (unregistered)

    "clever"? Those words should be in quotes. Building things that aren't obvious to maintain and stupid extensions to the language... Just stupid.

  • streetpc (unregistered) in reply to Belcat

    #define clever wtf

  • (cs) in reply to Belcat
    Belcat:
    "clever"? Those words should be in quotes. Building things that aren't obvious to maintain and stupid extensions to the language... Just stupid.
    Don't be so hard on him. He was clearly an English major with a CS minor. He probably should have been writing technical documentation rather than code.
  • krupa (unregistered)

    Who the hell ever says "whilst"?

  • joe (unregistered)

    Looks like an easy trick to keep a contract... fill the code with stuff that won't work unless a well defined #define a=b b=a line appears.

  • Pink Duck (unregistered)

    The contractor ought to check into the reasoning behind his decision to use 'whilst' over 'while'. Both are derived from ancient words, 'while' is the older and 'whilst' has mainly dropped out of usage in the US. 'whilst' is usually considered more formal and literary, which is certainly not the point of code. Plus it's an extra letter to type and introduces no benefit other than to a single individual - but of course the contractor needs to maintain his belovéd creations :)

  • (cs) in reply to Pink Duck
    Pink Duck:
    The contractor ought to check into the reasoning behind his decision to use 'whilst' over 'while'. Both are derived from ancient words, 'while' is the older and 'whilst' has mainly dropped out of usage in the US. 'whilst' is usually considered more formal and literary, which is certainly not the point of code. Plus it's an extra letter to type and introduces no benefit other than to a single individual - but of course the contractor needs to maintain his belovéd creations :)
    Sounds similar to the raging will/shall controversy, which of course is enflamed by the King James zealots with their wilt/shalt controversy.
  • John Doe (unregistered) in reply to Pink Duck
    Pink Duck:
    Plus it's an extra letter to type
    So, how about whil, whi, wh, or w then?

    Captcha: dolor, yes it's very painful to have to work with people like those "clever" contractors...

  • jim (unregistered) in reply to krupa

    I used the word "unbeknownst" in a bug report today. But it was tongue in cheek. (And before you rag me, YOU try saying "unbeknownst" with tongue in cheek.)

  • A Brit (unregistered)

    To be honest being British, these americanisms in programming languages are very annoying. I hate having to spell colour for example, the american way without the u. C# is full of them in the System namespace such as changing all the S's to Z's (like in Globalisation)

  • (cs) in reply to jim
    jim:
    I used the word "unbeknownst" in a bug report today. But it was tongue in cheek. (And before you rag me, YOU try saying "unbeknownst" with tongue in cheek.)
    Okay, I was willing. It came out audibly as, "unbenoans(farting noise)".
  • (cs) in reply to A Brit
    A Brit:
    To be honest being British, these americanisms in programming languages are very annoying. I hate having to spell colour for example, the american way without the u. C# is full of them in the System namespace such as changing all the S's to Z's (like in Globalisation)
    Well, you guys were once the empire upon which the sun never set. What happened? Got complacent?
  • (cs) in reply to A Brit
    A Brit:
    To be honest being British, these americanisms in programming languages are very annoying. I hate having to spell colour for example, the american way without the u. C# is full of them in the System namespace such as changing all the S's to Z's (like in Globalisation)

    What do you expect from a company that is resided in America? If Microsoft was in Spain or England, it would have went differently. Those words have been used that way in America for a long time, prolly one of the few things Microsoft don't own the rights to :)

  • Ben (unregistered) in reply to FredSaw

    Careful, the way our economy is going we'll be writing c#++ in chinese.

  • AdT (unregistered) in reply to FredSaw
    FredSaw:
    Well, you guys were once the empire upon which the sun never set. What happened? Got complacent?

    They overextended themselves. It can happen to anyone. What was the name of the next country Cheney wants to invade?

  • (cs) in reply to pitchingchris
    pitchingchris:
    A Brit:
    To be honest being British, these americanisms in programming languages are very annoying. I hate having to spell colour for example, the american way without the u. C# is full of them in the System namespace such as changing all the S's to Z's (like in Globalisation)

    What do you expect from a company that is resided in America? If Microsoft was in Spain or England, it would have went differently. Those words have been used that way in America for a long time, prolly one of the few things Microsoft don't own the rights to :)

    So found your own rival company, get as big as Microsoft, and change the default language to Spanish. I'm good with it. At least that language doesn't have a million exceptions for every rule.

  • (cs) in reply to AdT
    AdT:
    FredSaw:
    Well, you guys were once the empire upon which the sun never set. What happened? Got complacent?

    They overextended themselves. It can happen to anyone. What was the name of the next country Cheney wants to invade?

    Iran. Please god, let it happen. Maybe if we get our collective ass whipped into submission we (that is, the administration) will get a clue.

    Let the record show that I drive around Dallas with a bumper sticker that says, "Save our bill of rights! www.impeachbush.org"

    Addendum (2008-01-25 09:13): Lend your support. Let's kick that asshole out. Impeach Bush

  • Rob (unregistered) in reply to FredSaw
    FredSaw:
    A Brit:
    To be honest being British, these americanisms in programming languages are very annoying. I hate having to spell colour for example, the american way without the u. C# is full of them in the System namespace such as changing all the S's to Z's (like in Globalisation)
    Well, you guys were once the empire upon which the sun never set. What happened? Got complacent?

    World War II

  • (cs)

    They should have just refactored the code. while loops are useless anyway. Just use a 'for'.

  • AC (unregistered)

    That's not a WTF, the guy was simply a jerk. It certainly was his intention to make a bad joke or something. (As oppossed to the "write Pascal in C" macros)

    Captcha: Those are a Latin test now? Bah, need some time to remember this one.

  • (cs)

    I forgot which program it was but there was a famous UNIX program (Bash?) that used this kind of trick all over the place, things like:

    #define IF(x) if(x) { #define ENDIF(x) } #define FOREVER for(;;) { #define ENDFOREVER }

    It's very ugly but not that uncommon, I've seen it in some places, sadly...

  • A Brit (unregistered) in reply to A Brit
    A Brit:
    To be honest being British, these americanisms in programming languages are very annoying. I hate having to spell colour for example, the american way without the u. C# is full of them in the System namespace such as changing all the S's to Z's (like in Globalisation)

    Yeah I installed Firefox because I couldn't change IE's spelling of favourites

  • Yorch (unregistered)

    What's the problem? Clearly this guy is competent, studied and earned his "Works on my machine" certification. http://www.codinghorror.com/blog/archives/000818.html

    Gee... give him a break

    BTW. Thanks for my free sticker! I got it yesterday and have placed at my work's PC

  • A Yank (unregistered) in reply to A Brit

    You obviously don't hate it enough if you haven't tried to fix it. In vi-speak:

    :ab colour color

    The possibilities are limitless.

  • (cs)
    Your vocabulary is more embiggoned than that of your colleagues.
    I don't see what the problem is. They're perfectly cromulent words.
  • nt (unregistered) in reply to Pink Duck

    That's "belovèd".

  • (cs) in reply to A Brit
    A Brit:
    To be honest being British, these americanisms in programming languages are very annoying. I hate having to spell colour for example, the american way without the u. C# is full of them in the System namespace such as changing all the S's to Z's (like in Globalisation)
    Referring to colo(u)r both with and without a u are inefficient. Recommend replacing the word colo(u)r with the letter 'X' to save memory.
  • nt (unregistered) in reply to Shmurk
    Shmurk:
    I forgot which program it was but there was a famous UNIX program (Bash?) that used this kind of trick all over the place, things like:

    #define IF(x) if(x) { #define ENDIF(x) } #define FOREVER for(;;) { #define ENDFOREVER }

    It's very ugly but not that uncommon, I've seen it in some places, sadly...

    The original (1977) Bourne shell, actually. Here's the source.

  • Walleye (unregistered) in reply to krupa
    krupa:
    Who the hell ever says "whilst"?

    The Great Gonzo from the Muppet show often used it in the phrase "...whilst, and at the same time...".

  • KT (unregistered) in reply to Shmurk
    Shmurk:
    I forgot which program it was but there was a famous UNIX program (Bash?) that used this kind of trick all over the place, things like:

    #define IF(x) if(x) { #define ENDIF(x) } #define FOREVER for(;;) { #define ENDFOREVER }

    It's very ugly but not that uncommon, I've seen it in some places, sadly...

    #define ever (;;)

    ...

    for ever { printf("%s", "\a"); }

  • (cs) in reply to Rob
    Rob:
    FredSaw:
    A Brit:
    To be honest being British, these americanisms in programming languages are very annoying. I hate having to spell colour for example, the american way without the u. C# is full of them in the System namespace such as changing all the S's to Z's (like in Globalisation)
    Well, you guys were once the empire upon which the sun never set. What happened? Got complacent?

    World War II

    Not really. At the end of WWII the British were still in charge of most of the globe. Essentially the people in the colonies persuaded us that it was better not to be in charge any longer, and we gave the empire away. India being the best example. Other countries such as Australia and Canada effectively just weakened the links so that they operated in their own right rather than as part of the empire, a process that I think started well before WWII. WWII was of course what brought the US to prominence. Before that it was just a sleeping giant.

  • Not a Brit (but a Canadian) (unregistered) in reply to A Brit

    I understand what that's like, but that's often a library thing. I develop extensively with Ogre3D, which is maintained by non-US folks, so they use Colour. As a Canadian, I use 'our' too, but when programming I snap into a US spelling mindset. I often find myself mixing up the two regardless.

    Now, if a language introduced a keyword like "neighbour", that'd probably rile up a bunch of folks.

  • (cs) in reply to Shmurk
    Shmurk:
    I forgot which program it was but there was a famous UNIX program (Bash?) that used this kind of trick all over the place, things like:

    #define IF(x) if(x) { #define ENDIF(x) } #define FOREVER for(;;) { #define ENDFOREVER }

    It's very ugly but not that uncommon, I've seen it in some places, sadly...

    I've seen "#define FOREVER for(;;)" a few places; I've even seen it suggested in books. (I think Code Complete may even do so.)

    Including the opening brace though... that's a sin.

    I'm also reminded of my favorite entry I've seen to the IOCCC. It starts out with a whole ton of #defines for keywords that look like BASIC or Pascal, then a program written in them. Basically the the body of the program loos like it was written in Pascal, with some extra semicolons and other places the syntax isn't quite right. But the C program did something completely different than what the pseudo-Pascal program did. So you look at it and go "oh, that's just someone trying to be clever but not succeeding very well. Wait... oh wait..."

  • A Yank (unregistered) in reply to A Brit

    Technically, english from US and UK should be considered two different languages. It might be annoying, but it's not as difficult as trying to figure out that "medarbejder" is danish for co-worker. Thought it was dutch at first, but the dutch translator spits the word right back at me.

  • (cs) in reply to AdT
    AdT:
    FredSaw:
    Well, you guys were once the empire upon which the sun never set. What happened? Got complacent?

    They overextended themselves. It can happen to anyone. What was the name of the next country Cheney wants to invade?

    Shouldn't we finish the "wars" (what do we call them, missions? Something like that?) we started in Afghanastan (remember that one? We are still there, trying to find Osama) or Iraq?

    But hey, what's a few wars as long as the economy is strong and kicking ...

  • Sam (unregistered) in reply to FredSaw
    FredSaw:
    A Brit:
    To be honest being British, these americanisms in programming languages are very annoying. I hate having to spell colour for example, the american way without the u. C# is full of them in the System namespace such as changing all the S's to Z's (like in Globalisation)
    Well, you guys were once the empire upon which the sun never set. What happened? Got complacent?

    We liberated more countries than the US ever has. To be fair, we did conquer them first, but let history reflect that the UK was the great 20th-century liberator.

  • (cs)

    This story makes much more sense when you realize that Charles I.'s coworker wears a top hat, monocle and handlebar mustache!

  • uggalabugga (unregistered)

    Must be a holy cow from India. ;)

    luctus

  • Brady Kelly (unregistered) in reply to A Brit
    A Brit:
    To be honest being British, these americanisms in programming languages are very annoying. I hate having to spell colour for example, the american way without the u. C# is full of them in the System namespace such as changing all the S's to Z's (like in Globalisation)

    I just don't. Intellisense pops 'Color' in for me, and when I name something, I name it Colour. My code is also full of xxxDialogue classes.

  • (cs) in reply to A Yank
    A Yank:
    Technically, english from US and UK should be considered two different languages. It might be annoying, but it's not as difficult as trying to figure out that "medarbejder" is danish for co-worker. Thought it was dutch at first, but the dutch translator spits the word right back at me.

    For websites one of the first 'languages' they translate the site to is UK English (from US English). Yup, lots of z's to s's. and the our's.

    Must give them a margin of error because if a string goes untranslated, its still readable for the Brits

  • me too (unregistered)

    WHYST?!

  • IComp (unregistered) in reply to Rob

    Since this article is submitted by King Charles I, I'd have thought he'd be quite used to 'elegant' pronunciation. Although at his age its a wonder he can handle a computer at all.

  • Jon Hanna (unregistered) in reply to A Brit

    We can sort of forgive the S/Z thing, in this regard the Americans are simply more conservative; the Z spellings used to be more common than the S spellings (though both were acceptable) before a vogue for all things French brought made the French-like S spellings more popular. The Oxford English Dictionary still uses the Z spellings (see the commentary on http://www.iana.org/assignments/lang-tags/en-GB-oed for more).

    Webster's horrible decision to encourage his compatriots to leave out the U in words like colour is another matter though.

    Still, it's resulted in a strange idiolect for myself. "Colour" I think of as colour, reasonably enough, but "color" I think of as "an object or code used to describe a colour in a computer system", i.e green is a colour, but #00FF00 or System.Drawing.Color.FromArgb(0, 0, 0xFF, 0) or so on are colors.

    Which may make me seem a bit weird, but then all of us Old-World English-speakers use "program" when it comes to computers, though of course the origin of the spelling is that that is how American's spell programmes (the fact that programs haven't compared well with programmes since the 1950s probably helps).

  • (cs) in reply to DeLos
    DeLos:
    Four websites oneth ouf the first 'languages' they traunslateth the site tou is UK English (froum US English). Yup, louts of z's to s's. and the our's. Must giveth them a maurgin of errour bescause if a stringh goes untraunslated, it's still readaible for the Brits
    Here, fixed that for ya
  • Soviut (unregistered) in reply to A Brit
    A Brit:
    To be honest being British, these americanisms in programming languages are very annoying. I hate having to spell colour for example, the american way without the u. C# is full of them in the System namespace such as changing all the S's to Z's (like in Globalisation)

    I'm Canadian and spell it "colour" with the u as well. But I'd rather languages standardize to "american english" and know to always spell it "color" than to have to guess or check the docs for every single language I use.

    (I know captcha quoting is going out of style but this one says: dolor ...weird)

  • Mike Woodhouse (unregistered)

    The contractor's name wasn't Mark, was it? Back in the way-back-when I had a guy who used macros to make his C code look like Pascal;

    #define begin { #define end }

    and so on...

  • A Yank (unregistered) in reply to A Yank
    A Yank:
    You obviously don't hate it enough if you haven't tried to fix it. In vi-speak: 
    :ab colour color
    The possibilities are limitless.

    Didn't realize someone already made a post with the name A Yank. =P

  • (cs) in reply to MET
    MET:
    WWII was of course what brought the US to prominence. Before that it was just a sleeping giant.
    We like to think we came to prominence with the Boston tea party and the concept, "No taxation without representation".

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