#17 [0:55:39] "The kind of C I write, ..."

[Matthijs den Besten]

"The kind of C I write, most people don't understand" Linus says. Can we verify this? Where can we find examples of his code (preferable for git)? And how readable/complex is it?

[JeanV]

I have no knowledge in coding but what i understood by that sentence is that instead of using simple C coding, Linus has to create algorithms for better performance. Therefore, instead of needing knownledge in coding only you also have to be able to understand how each algorithm works.

Again, I believe that someone who actually knows coding will be able to answer that a lot better than i tried to do and even tell me I'm completely wrong and stupid :)

[Ruxandra Teodorescu]

He has many good ideas. He is a hacker. his mind is operating at different levels. the verification can be made, i think, by noticing the results after implementing the GIT.

So,I have no idea as well, but i have to complete Jean, Linus said "ugly" too.

[laurian choain]

I have a few suggestions:
-if there are no comments in his code then it's impossible do follow (even for the guy who wrote the code) without any comment, after two weeks without working on it, you won't know anymore why you did such thing.
-the other way to guess if the code is complex to understand is to calculate the complexity of the code, usually codes with low complexity are optimised so they could be harder to read (everybody can write a program in an ugly style with high complexity)
-I think only pierre is proeficient enough in algorithmic to tell us if his codes are complex to understand, Jean is right when he says that you usually need good knowledge of algorithmic to understand well what's happening.
last point: it's not because the code is simple (few lignes) that it is simple to understand what it does....

[Matthijs den Besten]

Well, show me the code! :)

[Jegou]

Peut-être que la difficulté émane de la nature du langage. A l'inverse du C++, ce n'est pas un langage orienté objet, moins facile à communiquer donc. Par contre, avec des commentaires bien structurés et une architecture bien ficelée, en théorie il n'y a pas de problème pour lire et comprendre le code.
Je pense que Linus a simplement son propre style et qu'il n'écrit pas nécessairement en vue de se faire comprendre.