tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2934352534884921566.post8933746222192269050..comments2014-02-17T00:05:13.294-08:00Comments on The Examined Code: The olfactory quality of our languageLeif Frenzelhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00159002463884989971noreply@blogger.comBlogger2125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2934352534884921566.post-39906213056379964152012-04-12T15:35:22.677-07:002012-04-12T15:35:22.677-07:00Thanks for your feedback.
I think you may be rig...Thanks for your feedback. <br /><br />I think you may be right with respect to the general English term; it might not be that heavily connotated with negativity. Then the more specifically we look at software literature, it relies much more on the negative force. <br /><br />The book from which I, personally, picked it up ten years or so ago was Martin Fowler's 'Refactoring' (which I still think is excellent, and one of the most deeply shaping influences for me personally in my early developer's life). There's a chapter about 'Bad smells in code' (written together with Kent Beck) that clearly makes the association, and also gives a direct statement of the problem-solution mindset. It says that describing smells will "give you indications that there is trouble that can be solved by a refatoring" (75). Again, I think it's an ingeniously chosen term. It does have this negative thrust, though.Anonymousnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2934352534884921566.post-49587749690439656262012-04-12T04:14:23.164-07:002012-04-12T04:14:23.164-07:00Yes, I think small difference in the way you think...Yes, I think small difference in the way you think can have huge effects. So focusing on the elegance of the result instead of the bad smell of the original code sounds great.<br /><br />Is the word "smell" originally really that negatively annotated? Maybe you just automatically think of "bad smell" because literature about "code smell" focuses on the negative view so much? You could just think of your refactoring as changing the "code smell" from suboptimal cases that come naturally into a very pleasurable scent :)Dballhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/02216154422521638804noreply@blogger.com