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Simple Ways of Reducing the Cognitive Load in Code

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Re: Simple Ways of Reducing the Cognitive Load in Code

#141

Post by amirouche »

jimbokun wrote: post #103
lenkite wrote: post #80

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Stream based programming is a paradigm that with some training and proper code indentation is much , much faster to read than a nested for loop. Once you get used to it,you can literally fast-scan code written in this style with the confidence that you are not missing anything. Also, assuming you do not use mutable state, it also has the advantage of being easily parallelizable without any code changes. (As well, as…

"Stream-based code is certainly not something you can read off the cuff." List transactionsIds = transactions.stream() .filter(t -> t.getType() == Transaction.GROCERY) .sorted(comparing(Transaction::getValue).reversed()) .map(Transaction::getId) .collect(toList()); I honestly think most programmers fluent in Java 7 programming, can guess this is finding "grocery" type transactions, sorting by "value" transaction prop…

Isn't the point of stream API a) to be able to iterate over infinite set of values b) to fiddle with the rate of "async" object generation?

I'm not sure I understand the difference between `compose' and stream APIs.

Re: Simple Ways of Reducing the Cognitive Load in Code

#142

Post by amirouche »

andrewprock wrote: post #87
ajuc wrote: post #41

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I agree in general case, but this example transactions.stream() .filter(t -> t.getType() == Transaction.GROCERY) .sorted(comparing(Transaction::getValue).reversed()) .map(Transaction::getId) .collect(toList()); seems to be net improvement to me. It reads like SQL, and eliminates many causes of error (wrong indexing variables, off-by-one, copy-paste error in boilerplate). Yes it requires learning several new concepts,…

While some people may like to read code that looks like SQL, I've found Java 8 features like this are poorly supported by the debugger, so debugging stuff like this tends to require "horse whispering" or rewriting the logic into something that can be stepped through.

GNU Gremlin is a stream API to traverse graphs.

Re: Simple Ways of Reducing the Cognitive Load in Code

#143

Post by Roboprog »

ViktorasM wrote: post #62

Stopped reading at "Place models, views and controllers in their own folders". No worse way to organize your code than classify by behavior type. "Here are all the daos", "here is all business logic", "here are all the controllers". You add a feature as small as resource CRUD and scatter it's pieces across the whole code base. No.

Also, be sure to repeat adjectives and other name parts as much as possible. Ideally, the same names could be used in the directory/package, file/class, function/method and variable names. Never let the reader forget that this is smurfView or batController or whatever.

/sarcasm

Re: Simple Ways of Reducing the Cognitive Load in Code

#144

Post by Roboprog »

ellyagg wrote: post #135
loco5niner wrote: post #112

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Honest question from someone with little real world experience outside .Net: This is MVC's convention, to "Place models, views and controllers in their own folders", and it's what I'm used to working with. Can you point me to resources outlining other methods (responding with google "XYZ" would be fine too).

Organize projects by feature: http://jaysoo.ca/2016/02/28/organizing-redux-application/

Thank you, thank you. THIS, exactly this.

Re: Simple Ways of Reducing the Cognitive Load in Code

#145

Post by kentosi »

jonhohle wrote: post #115

His second example to "modularize" a branch condition is not functionally equivalent in _most_ in-use programming languages: valid_user = loggedIn() && hasRole(ROLE_ADMIN) valid_data = data != null && validate(data) if (valid_user && valid_data) … Is not equivalent to: if (loggedIn() && hasRole(ROLE_ADMIN) && data != null && validate(data)) … His version will always execute `validate(…)` if `data` is not null regardl…

I guess the alternative would be:

    if (isValidUser() && isValidData(data)) …
Which would avoid the potentially expensive `validate()` without putting it all on the one line.

Re: Simple Ways of Reducing the Cognitive Load in Code

#146

Post by amirouche »

prawks wrote: post #120
loco5niner wrote: post #112

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Honest question from someone with little real world experience outside .Net: This is MVC's convention, to "Place models, views and controllers in their own folders", and it's what I'm used to working with. Can you point me to resources outlining other methods (responding with google "XYZ" would be fine too).

Django's recommended project structure is one that immediately comes to mind. A project is broken down into "applications" each which have their own models, views, and controllers (among other things like forms, tests, etc.). Each "application" is an area of responsibility within the project, like payment or user management. As it's python, the 'views' module could technically be a folder with multiple files inside i…

There several reasons to create a folder. The question is simplistic to me if the folder describe a `model' I call it model. If it describe a feature like "cart" I call it... `cart'...

Re: Simple Ways of Reducing the Cognitive Load in Code

#147

Post by amirouche »

greenshackle wrote: post #84
ViktorasM wrote: post #62

Stopped reading at "Place models, views and controllers in their own folders". No worse way to organize your code than classify by behavior type. "Here are all the daos", "here is all business logic", "here are all the controllers". You add a feature as small as resource CRUD and scatter it's pieces across the whole code base. No.

The guidelines for a framework I use is to put views and models in separate folders. Which means code for any model is spread out between at least two folders. Finding code is annoying.

To avoid that Django does split by "app" or feature first.

Re: Simple Ways of Reducing the Cognitive Load in Code

#148

Post by CGamesPlay »

saboot wrote: post #125
jonhohle wrote: post #115

His second example to "modularize" a branch condition is not functionally equivalent in _most_ in-use programming languages: valid_user = loggedIn() && hasRole(ROLE_ADMIN) valid_data = data != null && validate(data) if (valid_user && valid_data) … Is not equivalent to: if (loggedIn() && hasRole(ROLE_ADMIN) && data != null && validate(data)) … His version will always execute `validate(…)` if `data` is not null regardl…

Perhaps an alternative would be valid_user = loggedIn() && hasRole(ROLE_ADMIN) if (valid_user) { valid_data = data != null && validate(data) if (valid_data) { ... } }

For whatever reason, I'd prefer comments to this version. Note: I actually agree with the OP about pulling the logic into named conditionals whenever possible, but in the case you do want the short-circuiting behavior I would not bother with the variables at that point.

  if (loggedIn() && hasRole(ROLE_ADMIN)) {
    // User has permission to do this
    if (data != null && validate(data)) {
      // Submitted data is valid
      ...
    }
  }

Re: Simple Ways of Reducing the Cognitive Load in Code

#149

Post by amirouche »

throwanem wrote: post #110
alisey wrote: post #22

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yes, a Method Object pattern http://c2.com/cgi/wiki?MethodObject

Neat! Now I have to refer to an entirely different file (or a different section of this one, which is almost as bad) in order to figure out what this one function is doing.

maybe both are related.

I never understood people that create a function only to set a flag or a set of flags in another and pass everything else.

Also sometime doing code that looks like this

> > if a: > getting_started(d,e) > if a and c: > maybe_prepare(f,g) > common(d,e,f,g) >

Instead of

> > getting_started(a,b,c,d,e) > maybe_prepare(a,b,c,d,e) > common(a,b,c,d,e) >

Usually I leave branching for the leaf code. It's maybe just me.

Re: Simple Ways of Reducing the Cognitive Load in Code

#150

Post by collyw »

amirouche wrote: post #132
collyw wrote: post #98

Get a decent high level architecture, good, consistent database design and you don't write anywhere near as much application code. Start hacking about using one field for two purposes or having "special cases" and everything starts to get messy. These special one off cases will involve adding in more code at the application level increasing overall complexity. Repeat enough times and you will code a big ball of mud.…

I always read both side of the story the thing that is as the top (database design, overall architecture) basically the abstract principle. And the bottom part the actually precise drawing that executes as a program. Actually reviewing only unknown code from in an unknown file in an unknown function is very rare. You always come from the design/architecture point of view diving into more details. The translation of t…

"Actually reviewing only unknown code from in an unknown file in an unknown function is very rare."

I am not sure if I am understanding you correctly, but every programming job where you weren't the original author involves looking at unknown code and trying to work out what the hell it is doing.

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