Editing 1691: Optimization
Warning: You are not logged in. Your IP address will be publicly visible if you make any edits. If you log in or create an account, your edits will be attributed to your username, along with other benefits.
The edit can be undone.
Please check the comparison below to verify that this is what you want to do, and then save the changes below to finish undoing the edit.
Latest revision | Your text | ||
Line 8: | Line 8: | ||
==Explanation== | ==Explanation== | ||
− | + | {{incomplete|No title-text explanation}} | |
+ | This comic is a flowchart making fun of the difference between prematurely optimizing and just doing things right. Since you're consulting a flowchart to answer, you're prematurely optimizing. | ||
− | + | Donald Knuth in his paper "Structured Programming with Goto statements" said: | |
− | |||
− | |||
− | |||
− | |||
<blockquote> | <blockquote> | ||
"There is no doubt that the grail of efficiency leads to abuse. Programmers waste enormous amounts of time thinking about, or worrying about, the speed of noncritical parts of their programs, and these attempts at efficiency actually have a strong negative impact when debugging and maintenance are considered. We should forget about small efficiencies, say about 97% of the time: '''premature optimization is the root of all evil'''. Yet we should not pass up our opportunities in that critical 3%." | "There is no doubt that the grail of efficiency leads to abuse. Programmers waste enormous amounts of time thinking about, or worrying about, the speed of noncritical parts of their programs, and these attempts at efficiency actually have a strong negative impact when debugging and maintenance are considered. We should forget about small efficiencies, say about 97% of the time: '''premature optimization is the root of all evil'''. Yet we should not pass up our opportunities in that critical 3%." | ||
</blockquote> | </blockquote> | ||
− | |||
− | + | Source: http://web.archive.org/web/20130731202547/http://pplab.snu.ac.kr/courses/adv_pl05/papers/p261-knuth.pdf (Computing Surveys, Vol 6, No 4, December 1974) | |
− | + | The title text describes another time-wasting behaviour common in obsessively perfectionist coders: developing tools to analyse aspects, such as performance, of the software actually required. In the some fields, such as compilers or database design for instance, such tools are useful and productive, but the usage suggested here is more appropriately covered by instinct and common sense. | |
==Transcript== | ==Transcript== | ||
− | :[A flow chart is shown with three boxes connected with two arrows. The first box | + | :[A flow chart is shown with three boxes connected with two arrows. The first box rectangular:] |
− | :Are you | + | :Are you prematurely optimizing or just taking time to do things right? |
:[From the first box there is a short arrow straight down to a diamond shaped box:] | :[From the first box there is a short arrow straight down to a diamond shaped box:] | ||
:Are you consulting a flowchart to answer this question? | :Are you consulting a flowchart to answer this question? | ||
− | :[ | + | :[An arrow labeled "Yes" continues down to the last box, which is rectangularly shaped.] |
− | |||
− | |||
− | |||
:You are prematurely optimizing | :You are prematurely optimizing | ||
− | + | {{comic discussion}} | |
− | |||
− | |||
[[Category:Flowcharts]] | [[Category:Flowcharts]] | ||
− |