RE: Strange behavior w/%editc()

["Joe Pluta" <joepluta@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx>]

> From: James Rich
>
> Well let's just chalk it up to different coding preferences then.  As much
> as you dislike the extra syntax I hate reading through a compile listing
> or paging all the time to find out what a variable is.  I will gladly type
> a little more in order to know exactly what is going on.

I finally figured out why I don't agree with your position.  About the only
thing you get extra out of this is the type of the fields.  You don't even
get the lengths, and you certainly have no idea whether it's a file field, a
work field, or a display field.  So are you reading the program or modifying
it?  If you just want to be able to read the program, then yes, all that
extra stuff might make it a little easier.

But if you're modifying the code, you had better know what those fields are
and what they do and where they're used and where they came from.  And
you're not going to get any of that knowledge from that single statement.
So what does it really buy you?  I guess my point is that the knowledge you
gain isn't really that much compared to the amount of work you're imposing
on the programmer.

Before I change a line of code, I have already figured out what the
variables are and where they come from.  I don't need the program source to
tell me that, and so all that added syntax is pretty much useless to me.

Different styles of programming.

Joe