Path: utzoo!utgpu!water!watmath!clyde!att!osu-cis!tut.cis.ohio-state.edu!bloom-beacon!husc6!cca!g-rh
From: g-rh@cca.CCA.COM (Richard Harter)
Newsgroups: comp.edu
Subject: Re: a point to ponder
Message-ID: <30607@cca.CCA.COM>
Date: 8 Jul 88 18:57:30 GMT
References: <82400008@p.cs.uiuc.edu> <2103@boulder.Colorado.EDU> <781@cunixc.columbia.edu>
Reply-To: g-rh@CCA.CCA.COM.UUCP (Richard Harter)
Organization: Computer Corp. of America, Cambridge, MA
Lines: 28

In article <781@cunixc.columbia.edu> fuat@cunixc.cc.columbia.edu (Fuat C. Baran) writes:
>In article <2103@boulder.Colorado.EDU> cdash@boulder.Colorado.EDU (Charles Shub) writes:
>>And because of the turnaround, we wrote programs differently than we do now.
>>We would find the errors instead of letting the compiler do it. Is the change
>>in how we write and debug code for the better or the worse ?  Why ?

>For the better!  We're not here to serve the computer (i.e. submit
>perfect morsels of code), but the other way around.  The computer
>should serve us to the best of its ability.  This involves letting the
>compiler find the errors and allowing us to fix them interactively.
>Why waste human time coding, pretending to be a compiler, having cards
>punched, verified, submitted, etc. when computer time is cheaper?

	This is very much a two sided coin -- in the old system the human
being had to be a diligent proof reader.  Nowadays we let the computer do
the dog work of proofreading.  The trouble is that people let the machine
take over the whole job, and the machine can't do it.  Thus you get 
books written on word processors in which every word is spelled correctly
-- with the wrong words being used.  You get the same effect in software;
people write slop and jiggle it interactively until it works.



-- 

In the fields of Hell where the grass grows high
Are the graves of dreams allowed to die.
	Richard Harter, SMDS  Inc.