Re: [boost] Re: algorithms namespace

From: Darren Cook (darren_at_[hidden])
Date: 2004-02-21 19:00:48

>>Besides which, "fs" is difficult for an English-as-a-second-language
>>speaker to look up in the dictionary.  I have the impression that some
>>simply don't care about that because English is _their_ first language
>>-- an unfortunate attitude.
> 
> Well. It's actually the opposite. Because English is (presumably) your first
> language, you prefer the non-abbreviated "filesystem" over "fs". From the
> perspective of someone who doesn't "think in English", the two have pretty
> much the same inherent value, i.e. they are arbitrary identifiers. 

And to prove the point I didn't realize until following this thread that 
stdio was "standard i/o". I've always pronounced it "studio" and never 
stopped to think why the "u" was dropped and what it had to do with studios.

> A mental
> mapping translates these identifiers into the entities they represent. Since
> the extra letters in the longer identifier do not add any semantic value to
> non-English speakers, they are merely clutter and do not contribute to
> readability.

Exactly. And if the longer name causes a line break then it has reduced 
readability.

Darren