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A comment on Come Break My Compiler. Parent comment

Re:Come Break My Compiler by photochemsyn on Thursday March 09, 2023 @08:15AM (#35080840)
Good grammar? "Real programmers" is a colloquialism, and being concerned about good grammar is an indication that the subject is formal or technical writing, in which such constructions should be avoided. "Real programmers" is borrowed from "real men" and that expression is a colloquial synonym for "douche bag", according to this reference:

https://www.urbandictionary.com/define.php?term=real%20men

This is clear if we ask, 'what's the opposite of a real programmer?' - perhaps an imaginary programmer?

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Re:Come Break My Compiler by jasode on Thursday March 09, 2023 @09:05AM (#35081255)
>Good grammar? "Real programmers" is a colloquialism, [...] This is clear if we ask, 'what's the opposite of a real programmer?' - perhaps an imaginary programmer?

No, that's not the misinterpretation that gp (ggambetta) was trying explain with the missing commas causing parsing confusion.

The "real programmer" isn't the main confusion. It's the missing commas.

The author was trying to convey (with some sarcasm) how some programmers have a sense of superiority when they can program in the abstraction layer underneath the programming language others are using. E.g. You code in Javascript?!? Meh, real programmers code in C. You code in C?!? Real programmers code in assembly. etc.

It's only after some readers get to the 4th sentence ("butterflies") that they backtrack to the previous sentences and realize they're missing commas. : It’s really an age old dilemma in computers: “real programmers” write code in C. No [,] “real programmers” write code in Assembly. No [,] “real programmers” write code in binary. No, wait, “real programmers” use butterflies.

Analogous to this XKCD joke about "purity" : https://xkcd.com/435/

The distraction of readers trying to parse the missing commas -- detracted from the author's intended rhetorical effect.

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Re:Come Break My Compiler by skwheel on Thursday March 09, 2023 @09:22AM (#35081424)
Yes, exactly. I really thought the author was trying to argue that no one writes in assembly. But then when I reached the butterfly line, I realized it was just sloppy writing missing commas.
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