From mboxrd@z Thu Jan 1 00:00:00 1970 Received: (from majordomo@localhost) by pauillac.inria.fr (8.7.6/8.7.3) id RAA28994; Fri, 18 Jun 2004 17:39:45 +0200 (MET DST) X-Authentication-Warning: pauillac.inria.fr: majordomo set sender to owner-caml-list@pauillac.inria.fr using -f Received: from nez-perce.inria.fr (nez-perce.inria.fr [192.93.2.78]) by pauillac.inria.fr (8.7.6/8.7.3) with ESMTP id RAA28983 for ; Fri, 18 Jun 2004 17:39:43 +0200 (MET DST) Received: from herd.plethora.net (herd.plethora.net [205.166.146.1]) by nez-perce.inria.fr (8.12.10/8.12.10) with ESMTP id i5IFdgEV002701 for ; Fri, 18 Jun 2004 17:39:42 +0200 Received: from bhurt.plethora.net (bhurt.plethora.net [205.166.146.49]) by herd.plethora.net (8.11.6/8.10.1) with ESMTP id i5IFdci11144; Fri, 18 Jun 2004 10:39:39 -0500 (CDT) Date: Fri, 18 Jun 2004 10:45:20 -0500 (CDT) From: Brian Hurt X-X-Sender: bhurt@localhost.localdomain To: Sebastien Ferre cc: Ocaml Mailing List Subject: Re: [Caml-list] Great Programming Language Shootout Revived In-Reply-To: <40D2B7C8.6090900@aber.ac.uk> Message-ID: MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: TEXT/PLAIN; charset=US-ASCII X-Miltered: at nez-perce with ID 40D30CBE.000 by Joe's j-chkmail (http://j-chkmail.ensmp.fr)! X-Loop: caml-list@inria.fr X-Spam: no; 0.00; caml-list:01 shootout:01 indentation:01 disadvantage:01 rank:99 newlines:01 indenting:01 shorter:01 ocaml:01 wrote:03 variable:03 sebastien:03 redirect:95 seems:05 probably:05 Sender: owner-caml-list@pauillac.inria.fr Precedence: bulk On Fri, 18 Jun 2004, Sebastien Ferre wrote: > What about counting characters instead (counting several spaces in > a row as only one character) ? As most languages just don't mind > where you cut the lines, this seems to me a more fair measure. > Also, this would give complete freedom on the indentation style > without resulting in any disadvantage for the language rank. > > Just a suggestion :) > Actually, the idea I like is to pick a standard compression algorithm- say gzip, or bzip2- and compress the files. This actually gives you a decent approximation of the amount of information the soure code contains- and entire sidesteps a lot of issues. In addition to newlines and indenting, it also minimizes the effect of variable name length. For example, the average name length for ocaml programs is probably a lot shorter than the average name length for java programs. -- "Usenet is like a herd of performing elephants with diarrhea -- massive, difficult to redirect, awe-inspiring, entertaining, and a source of mind-boggling amounts of excrement when you least expect it." - Gene Spafford Brian ------------------- To unsubscribe, mail caml-list-request@inria.fr Archives: http://caml.inria.fr Bug reports: http://caml.inria.fr/bin/caml-bugs FAQ: http://caml.inria.fr/FAQ/ Beginner's list: http://groups.yahoo.com/group/ocaml_beginners