A tutorial on D templates

Walter Bright newshound2 at digitalmars.com
Sat Jan 14 14:46:43 PST 2012


On 1/14/2012 1:00 PM, Nick Sabalausky wrote:
> "Walter Bright"<newshound2 at digitalmars.com>  wrote in message
> news:jesl4i$30v3$1 at digitalmars.com...
>>
>> You and I are going to disagree on this.
>>
>
> Dosn't the reader mean "The reader and I are going to disagree on this"? ;)
> (only j/k, of course. Although I have always hated when authors say "the
> reader" instead of "you" which is what was obviously meant anyway. I just
> sounds bad. I always read it as a clear sign the author was trying *way* too
> hard to be "correct".)

I agree with your comment about "the reader" being pretentious.

As for my use of "you" there, I was talking specifically to Jonathan. That's 
different from writing a tech manual. Wearing jeans is appropriate in a 
conversation.

>> But I will add that excessive use of "you" in technically minded books
>> tends to, in my mind, reduce the book a grade in quality.
>
> The key there is "excessive use", not "any use". Eliminating excessive use
> of "you" certainly improves the quality. But compulsively eliminating "you",
> at best, makes the text sound pedantic, at worst, decreases the quality.
> Either way, compulsively eliminating it leads to pointless contrivances and
> awkward euphemisms like "the reader".

The steps are:

Novice: follow the rules because you're told to

Master: follow the rules because you understand the rules

Guru: break the rules because you know the limits of the rules


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