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A comment on Whistleblowers: Software keeping inmates in Arizona prisons beyond release dates. Parent comment

Re:Whistleblowers: Software keeping inmates in Arizona priso... by UweSchmidt on Monday February 22, 2021 @05:06PM (#26231313)
Only the programmed end result in code would be legally binding. Lawmakers would have a big interst in making sure the code is correct and provide incentives/change procedures accordingly.

The inmates in this article would be released immediately after the code-law is implemented; you could apply new tax laws (i.e. as a config file) to your accounting software.

Why maintain an obfuscated legal text when you need it in software anyway?

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Re:Whistleblowers: Software keeping inmates in Arizona priso... by oftenwrong on Monday February 22, 2021 @06:45PM (#26232172)
The legal text is the specification. What you're suggesting is the equivalent of the classic "the spec is whatever the implementation does", and would erase the distinction between correct, incorrect, and undefined behaviour.
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Re:Whistleblowers: Software keeping inmates in Arizona priso... by colejohnson66 on Monday February 22, 2021 @09:23PM (#26233180)
In other words: “it’s not a bug. it’s a feature!”
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