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From: john larkin <JL@gct.com>
Newsgroups: sci.electronics.design
Subject: Re: Datasheet-flation?
Date: Fri, 29 Nov 2024 18:12:17 -0800
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On Fri, 29 Nov 2024 23:30:59 +0100, "Carlos E.R."
<robin_listas@es.invalid> wrote:

>On 2024-11-29 16:21, john larkin wrote:
>> On Thu, 28 Nov 2024 20:42:59 -0700, Don Y
>> <blockedofcourse@foo.invalid> wrote:
>> 
>>> On 11/28/2024 6:49 AM, Carlos E.R. wrote:
>>>>> Do *you* "write for yourself" or "write for others"?
>>>>>
>>>>> I.e., do you write assuming YOU are the Reader?  Or, that
>>>>> OTHERS will be the Reader?
>>>>>
>>>>> [There seems to be a split on how developers write; I think
>>>>> this would affect their choice of (spoken) languages as well.]
>>>>
>>>> Ah. If I write a script I tend to mix English and Spanish. I tend to use
>>>> English thinking of sharing the script or asking questions about it. The places
>>>> where I do that are English speaking mostly.
>>>
>>> I always write for others -- as, if I have to revisit the code
>>> a year or five hence, *I* will effectively BE one of those
>>> "others".
>> 
>> Some guy wrote a c program that strips comments from c programs. His
>> reasoning is that the code speaks for itself, and the comments are
>> always wrong.
>
>Ridiculous.
>
>> 
>> I assume that program was not commented.
>> 
>> 
>> I saw a bit of actual Windows source code, and it had a mandatory,
>> standard comment section at the start of any block of code. It said
>> 
>> */
>> Author:    Jim Smith
>> Date:         2018
>> Purpose:  what it says
>> /*
>
>
>My first job was as programmer for small company. They had tasked an 
>external programmer with creating a software for them with LabWindows. 
>This thing creates displays; think a virtual oscilloscope display, for 
>instance, measuring things like temperature, pressure, rpm, etc. My boss 
>says "I want you to add a voltage display". Simple.
>
>Well, the original programmer had removed the header file that assigned 
>labels to both the display windows and the code. The code would say 
>"display_crt(31, A1)", where 31 was the element in the display to 
>display rpm, for instance. If I inserted "voltage" in the display 
>window, all the numbers shifted by one, so that 31 became pressure, for 
>instance.
>
>The programmer had sabotaged the code so that no one could touch it by 
>replacing labels with their values.
>
>It took me months to recreate the header file with labels. My boss 
>thought I was useless: it is difficult to explain this to a non programmer.
>
>I carefully documented since then every program I wrote. I did not want 
>any other person to suffer what I did.

I worked with (with not for, briefly!) a company that had an engineer
make one thing work somehow and then sent it to manufacturing and told
them to make copies. No drawings, no schematics.