1513: Code Quality

2015-04-17T11:53:47Z

AlexC: plenty of crying-face emoji even in standard ASCII

{{comic
| number = 1513
| date = April 17, 2015
| title = Code Quality
| image = code quality.png
| titletext = I honestly didn't think you could even USE emoji in variable names. Or that there were so many different crying ones.
}}

==Explanation==

{{incomplete| Needs fine-tuning and explaining of ponytails three comments}}
Cueball asks Ponytail to look at some source code that he has written, warning her that he is self-taught so his code probably won't be written the way she is used to. Although few programming languages require a perfectly rigid style so long as the code is syntactically accurate, most programmers follow some sort of {{w|Programming_style|style}} to make the code easier to read. This includes indenting lines to show levels and using descriptive variable identifiers with {{w|CamelCase|"camel case"}} capitalization (capitalizing each word except for the first.) In spite of Ponytail's initial (polite) optimism, she comments in three increasingly harsh and absurd similes. Finally, Cueball surrenders and makes the rather weak assurance that he will read “a style guide”—he doesn't think that following a complete course is in order.

A common technique for self-taught programmers is to follow and adapt tutorials, and to find examples of similar problems being solved and try to copy the code. This can (but doesn't always) lead to code that is hard to follow or otherwise "messy" as various different pieces of code are {{w|Jury_rig|jury-rigged}} together and tinkered with until they seem to work. Once a piece of code is working, it is usually considered too hard to go back and rewrite it to be cleaner or clearer, also at the risk of breaking something that has been working. This practice is known as {{w|refactoring}} and code projects that incorporate cycles of refactoring tend to be easier to read and maintain than those that don't.

The title text refers to {{w|emoji}}, or "smiley faces". They exist in Unicode, or can be simulated using ASCII characters. Many languages will allow variable names to include underscores, so a variety of sad face ASCII emoji will be legal variable names, such as <code>T_T</code>, <code>p_q</code>, <code>ioi</code> etc. Progressively more possible crying-face emoji are possible if variables can include [http://hexascii.com/sad-emoticons/ UTF8 characters] or full Unicode.

In the realm of Unicode, there are many crying emojis, as the comic states (e.g. 😢,😭,😂,😿,😹) In most programming languages it would be impossible to use them in variable names, as the symbols would break the language's syntax rules. A notable exception to this is {{w|Swift (programming language)|Swift}}, Apple's new programming language, in which the code can understand and use emojis in variables. Java, as another example, allows unicode characters in variable names as long as they are letter, numeric, combining or non-formatting marks. (See [http://docs.oracle.com/javase/specs/jls/se7/html/jls-3.html#jls-3.8] and [http://docs.oracle.com/javase/7/docs/api/java/lang/Character.html#isUnicodeIdentifierPart%28int%29]). Also, some C++ compilers support foreign Unicode characters and can have emoji in that manner.

==Transcript==
:[Cueball showing Ponytail his laptop]
:Cueball: Keep in mind that I'm self-taught, so my code may be a little messy.
:Ponytail: Lemme see - I'm sure it's fine.

:[Ponytail sits at desk]
:Ponytail: ...Wow. This is like being in a house built by a child using nothing but a hatchet and a picture of a house.

:Ponytail: It's like a salad recipe written by a corporate lawyer using a phone autocorrect that only knew Excel formulas.

:Ponytail: It's like someone took a transcript of a couple arguing at IKEA and made random edits until it compiled without errors.
:Cueball: '''''Okay,''''' I'll read a style guide.

{{comic discussion}}


[[Category:Comics featuring Cueball]]
[[Category:Comics featuring Ponytail]]

explain xkcd - User contributions [en]

1513: Code Quality