From: bill.gunshannon@gmail.com

On 12/1/2025 4:23 PM, Dan Cross wrote:
> In article <10gk6e6$1bcst$3@dont-email.me>,
> Simon Clubley   wrote:
>>> Now this is opinion, and really a poor argument.  While I detest the
verbosity
>>> in most things, that is my choice, not the problem you claim.
>>
>> Back on topic, COBOL is very verbose, but I also hate way too concise
>> languages where the language designers don't even allow words like
>> "function" to be spelt out in full. You read code many more times than
>> you write it and having cryptic syntax makes that a lot harder to achieve.
>
> Excessive verbosity can be a hindrance to readability, but
> finding a balance with concision is more art that science.  I
> don't feel the need to spell out "function" when there's an
> acceptable abbreviation that means the same thing ("fn"/"fun"/
> etc).  That said, a lot of early Unix code that omitted vowels
> for brevity was utterly abstruse.
>
>> Something like Ada was designed for readability, and I wish all other
>> languages followed that example.
>
> Unfortunately, what's considered "readable" is both subjective
> and depends on the audience.  Personally, I don't find Ada more
> readable because they it forces me to write `function` instead
> of `fn` or `procedure` instead of `proc`.  If anything, I find
> the split between two types of subprograms less readadable, no
> matter how it's presented syntacticaly.  Similarly, I don't find
> the use of `begin` and `end` keywords more readable than `{` and
> `}`, or similar lexical glyphs.  I understand that others feel
> differently.
>
> If anything, I find it less readable since it is less visually
> distinct (perhaps, if I my eyesight was even worse than it
> already is, I would feel differently).
>
>> Just waiting for the moment when a newcomer designs a new language which
>> has syntax resembling TECO... :-)
>
> Or APL.

Nothing wrong with APL, if the task is within the languages domain.
But then, I am one of the last advocates for domain specific rather
than generic languages.

bill

--- SoupGate-Win32 v1.05
 * Origin: you cannot sedate... all the things you hate (1:229/2)