Re: [OT] Good Article on API Design
Re: [OT] Good Article on API Design
- Subject: Re: [OT] Good Article on API Design
- From: Ian Joyner <email@hidden>
- Date: Tue, 10 Jul 2007 17:22:10 +1000
Actually, Michi's other article on the demise of CORBA is also
interesting – apart from the personal historical perspective of being
associated with those people (in a small way). It provides a good
case study of why things fail. A few things that stick out, technical
complexity, especially in the API, and lack of comprehensible
documentation (typical standards body problem).
http://www.acmqueue.com/modules.php?name=Content&pa=showpage&pid=396
Ian
On 10/07/2007, at 11:05 AM, Ian Joyner wrote:
On 10/07/2007, at 4:37 AM, Chuck Hill wrote:
This came out in the latest issue of ACM Queue. It is a very good
article on API design issues and mistakes. It is a bit long but I
think well worth reading:
http://acmqueue.com/rd.php?c.488
You can also get a free subscription to Queue. For a free
computer magazine, this one is surprising worth reading. There is
usually at least one article worth reading and the interviews are
interesting.
Yes it was for the most part interesting. Many interesting points,
but I thought he paid little attention to Design by Contract, which
is the major way of good API design covering most of what Michi
said, and documenting without documenting (yes that's what I meant
to write, I think JavaDoc is horrible, like the bolts on
Frankinstein's monster's neck) (and interestingly, the libraries
that use DbC have very consistent naming conventions which greatly
contribute to ergonomics). Still it is very much worth reading.
Glad you pointed out ACM Queue - I usually find CACM frustrating,
although I did read an interesting article by Peter Naur in
January's issue last weekend.
Actually Michi Henning is a blast from the past. He used to work at
DSTC in Brisbane and I used to go there a lot doing distributed
standards work. He was working on CORBA though which was not my
direct interest (and I still think CORBA had a horrible IDL).
Ian
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