Carmack about static analysis

[bearophile]

Derek Parnell:

> But isn't lint written by humans?

Right, but this doesn't mean a lot, because most programs don't work the same way humans and human brains think.


>I'm under the impression that a //lint// program is an attempt to emulate a very pedantic (if not anal-retentive) person who in real life would have no real friends, due to their obsessive–compulsive habit for extreme nit-picking.<

But the mind of such person and a lint work in very different ways. So they are often able to spot different classes of problems.


>The article you reference is primarily saying that this specific lint-like functionality contains bugs. It is not an argument to convince us to abandon lint functionality.<

Both my post and that link weren't meant to abadon lints, I like the idea of lints :-) I have shown that blog post as an example of the wide difference between lints skills and human programmers skills.


>I once, long ago, suggested to Walter/Andrei that D is approaching the ASCII equivalent of APL.<

I have used the K language a bit, that is one "ASCII equivalent" of APL, and it's nowhere D both in semantics, readability, and conciseness :-) Writing K code is more like solving a puzzle. And reading it is like solving a different puzzle.

Bye,
bearophile