Re: Stuff to do

[DervishD <zsh@dervishd.net>]

    Hi Bart :)

 * Bart Schaefer <schaefer@brasslantern.com> dixit:
> On Sep 27,  3:09pm, DervishD wrote:
> }     I've read some of the code in zsh and sincerely, I would
> } start it from scratch.
> 
> Having worked in the software industry for going on 20 years now, I
> can say with quite some confidence that once a piece of code
> reaches a certain level of complexity, this is almost always the
> wrong approach.

    I think that this depends on how messy is the code in the
project. I mean, if the code is so messy (and that doesn't mean
complex) that every time you touch anything you wreck havoc, then
doing something from start is a good idea (IMHO).

    I suppose that it's a question of evaluating maintainability
versus the effort of starting from scratch. If a project is barely
maintainable, sometimes it's better to start from scratch, but again
that depends on how complex the design is, of course.

> Zsh passed that level of complexity a very long time ago.

    I know, and of course I'm not asking you to start the code from
scratch, I'm just saying that *I* would do it ;)) I have a project
that too passed that level of complexity a time ago, and in fact I
left the project in the hands of the other co-author because I wasn't
motivated enough to continue, and probably rewriting it will be a
complete stupidity, but if I had the time, I swear I'll rewrite it
from scratch. I simply hate maintaining code that tries to resist
every try of being maintained and which contains pieces that nobody
understands XD

    With Zsh, I think that I would use a subset of it, as you
suggest, if I would start a "new-Zsh". Rewriting all from the scratch
is probably impossible now, because if you want to create a
bug-compatible version of "new-Zsh" you will probably have to use the
same code, so...

    Raúl Núñez de Arenas Coronado

-- 
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