From: James Britt <james_b@...>
Date: 2005-10-29T01:29:26+09:00
Subject: Re: "Readability" inflation

David A. Black wrote:
> That leaves me wondering why all these suggestions keep arising.

My Instant Theory:

Early users (circa release of Programming Ruby, 1st edition , or 
earlier) of Ruby were language geeks, the sort of people who actively 
scan the horizon for interesting programming languages.  They are 
already accustomed to a variety of syntax, so readability is a fairly 
fluid concept.

Once Ruby started getting more attention it attracted a wider audience, 
including many with less broad language experience and a different idea 
of readability.

I haven't gone back to see who has been advocating or supporting what 
change or additions, so I do not know if this is even remotely accurate. 
  But there are certain topics that have attained permathread status, 
and syntax munging is becoming one of them as Ruby attracts more users.

I also suspect that on this matter Ruby is a "victim" of its own 
success.  It makes it far easier to create DSLs and more-readable code, 
and may have raised users' expectations about such.

(In fact, when I explain Ruby to people, among the first things I tell 
them about is method_missing and send, and how, with those two things, 
you can write almost anything like you like and get Ruby to do something 
useful.)

James

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