I've noticed that most of my professors don't use syntax hilighting in VIM. They will either use white on black, or green on black. Does /prog/ think that this makes them worse programmers?
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Anonymous2008-03-24 18:13
Excessive syntax highlighting is distracting. All you need is bold for builtins/keywords, something to identify strings, and paren-flashing.
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Anonymous2008-03-24 18:49
>>41 Excessive syntax highlighting is distracting. All you need is.
Fixed it for you.
Expert programmers write all their code on the back of napkins, like Leonardo da Vinci did.
If they have to read someone else's code, they first print it out on an old matrix printer. They use colored paper to group sections of the program, and highlight important parts and errors with a marker.
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Anonymous2008-03-24 22:21
>>14
With all the time people spend programming on rocks, I'd hate to be reliant on a computer.
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Anonymous2008-03-24 22:41
Hi, OP's professor here. I don't use syntax highlighting cause I'm not a faggot.
>>48
FUCK! I've been coding on the FRONT of napkins!
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Anonymous2008-03-25 1:09
Interesting topic...
Have you ever heard someone complain that they can't read Lisp? I don't mean because of the parentheses, but because it's very regular. You have to rely on context to interpret the meaning of the code. The visual aspects don't immediately reveal to the reader what it all means.
Take the simple example of Visual Basic. What does foo mean? Is it a procedure/function call, or a variable, or what? There's no visual clue. Compare this to C's foo vs. foo().
In Lisp, pretty much the only visual clues you have are (foo) is "call the procedure/macro foo" and foo is "the variable foo".
At first I thought these complainers were just stupid because they couldn't read Lisp. But after some thought, I realized that some people just really find it difficult reading contextual language, and maybe it was a valid complaint.
Other visual clues are more helpful for the meaning of blocks of code for viewing at a distance, or quickly. The prime example, of course, indentation. In Lisp, good indentation is very important for reading. And pretty much in most languages, if you want your code to be seen rather than deciphered.
This brings me to colors (or bolds/highlight/etc). Personally, I prefer very few colors in my code. I'll permit dark grays. I find highlighting quite distracting sometimes. But I do believe that for some people, colors have use like indentation. Colors can be used to make people write correct code, and colors can help people read code better. Take the example of parenthesis matching. For a Lisper, it is very useful. For other programmers, even, it is still useful.
Finally I would like to say that someone supposed that being reliant on the computer is bad. I disagree. Let me preface by saying that by "reliant", I mean using the computer to be helpful with our mistakes, not that we can only write code with a computer and otherwise we are helpless. We let the computer do things that are a waste of time for us. If I look at another person's piece of code, is it immediately obvious to me that there is an unterminated string constant? If I have syntax highlighting, it sure is. Why should I have to scan through it myself just to validate the syntax? People write programs with compilers, references, editors, an internet connection and Led Zeppelin. Wanting a computer for syntax highlighting isn't an issue. It's there because people make mistakes; it's part of being human. This is why compilers do syntax checking. I don't presume your argument is also that a compiler shouldn't do syntax checking because the human can do that?
This is a long post, but the subject interests me.
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Anonymous2008-03-25 1:16
>>53
Actually I suppose the compiler has to do syntax checking in order to generate the AST. But the compiler also tells you about it and gives you information. If the human always gets it right, generating this information would be useless. But humans are stupid.
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Anonymous2008-03-25 4:42
>>48
JAYKAY ROLLING WROTE ``HARRY POTTER'' ON NAPKINS.
>>53
I tried to write a lengthy reply to this twice. I think the ability to read code with obsessive precision is vital to being a programmer. Syntax highlighting, like spell-check highlighting, will make you dumber.
>>61
read some kernel code without syntax highlighting.
After 50 lines or so you'll be lost.
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Anonymous2008-03-25 19:00
>>62
That's the whole point.
Stay the fuck away from the kernel btw.
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Anonymous2008-03-25 19:21
>>62
How could I possibly make sense of "the kernel" after reading only 50 lines of it? And if syntax highlighting has any bearing on your ability to understand code, stay the fuck away from all code, ever.
This thread reminds me of when I was forced to use Eclipse and Java in a course.
I don't know about the others, but when I'm in the middle of typing and some of the text changes color or something gets highlighted then de-highlighted, it's distracting. And the automated syntax checking is even worse - "You have an undeclared variable here." "Missing parenthesis." "Uninitialized variable." I'm perfectly aware of that and I'll fix it later, but right now the code I happen to be working on is more important. SHUT THE FUCK UP, MACHINE.
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Anonymous2008-03-26 2:54
>>66
I used Eclipse just recently, and my reaction was the same almost word-for-word. The rage was palpable.
Luckily I was just trying it out for curiosity's sake on a lab machine, so I had the luxury of closing it in disgust.
>>77
You should learn about syntax highlighting while you're still in college. It will save you some embarrassment later. Nobody seems to have told you yet, but you won't get to keep using lisp once you graduate.