Relay-Version: version B 2.10 5/3/83; site utzoo.UUCP Posting-Version: version B 2.10.3 4.3bsd-beta 6/6/85; site seismo.CSS.GOV Path: utzoo!linus!gatech!seismo!keith From: keith@seismo.CSS.GOV (Keith Bostic) Newsgroups: net.lang.c Subject: Re: C style Message-ID: <309@seismo.CSS.GOV> Date: Wed, 2-Oct-85 00:40:18 EDT Article-I.D.: seismo.309 Posted: Wed Oct 2 00:40:18 1985 Date-Received: Wed, 2-Oct-85 21:21:50 EDT Organization: Center for Seismic Studies, Arlington, VA Lines: 29 Summary: Splitting code for readability isn't necessarily a good idea. References: <1556@brl-tgr.ARPA> <139200011@uiucdcsb> In article <139200011@uiucdcsb>, kenny@uiucdcsb.CS.UIUC.EDU writes: > For Heaven's sake, the big problem with this code is that the conditional > is quite unreadable in in-line code like this. I'd prefer while (illegal (ch = getch())) beep (); addch (ch); refresh (); ... int illegal (ch) char ch; { return ((ch < 1 || ch > 5) && ch != 'E'); } > which at least separates the test from the action. I realize that it also > moves the test further away physically in the code, but I think the price > is worthwhile. It may enhance readability, but it's not worthwhile. You've just managed to add a context switch per *character*. Now, imagine what that's going to do to a program like spell. I'm not arguing that everything in the world should be inline code, but there are still certain real-world limitations even applications programmers should be aware of. --keith