> The art of software development is in taking a problem, breaking it up in to bite-size chunks, and putting those chunks together to form a practical solution. Anyone who considers themselves a "better" programmer because their functions are large due to their ability to handle large functions needs to keep their ego in check. Mental capacity has nothing to do with it. > > My philosophy for functions is simple... a function does one well-defined, discrete task, and it does it well. The inputs are clearly specified, and the potential outputs/exceptions are fully understood. Sound familiar? These requirements make it incredibly easy to write unit tests for the code. > > The number of times a function is used does not enter my field of interest. It's irrelevant, as is the number of lines in each function. Following this philosophy does naturally lead to fairly small functions, but as you move up the levels of abstraction they tend to grow larger. For PHP, I consider code in a file that's not within a function to be a function in itself, and the same philosophy applies. > Stuart, Your philosophy is interesting. Of course, a function should have one well-defined and discrete task, but it is not always clear what one task is. Let me take an example of a list. For example, you want to write a function that removes an element from a list. In this example, we will only use this list to remove items from it, so the code required here won't be used another time. Now you have a few possibilities: 1) (This one is probably Tony's approach): Write a single function that searches the element and removes it from the list. 2) (My approach): Write a search function first, even though we're not going to use it elsewhere), then write a delete function that uses the search function to find it and remove it. 3) (Crazy approach ;)): Write a function that gets the next element in the list, write a search function that uses the previous one. Write a delete function that uses the search function, and then calls a function that removes the actual element. With your philosophy all three can fit. The other interesting part in this discussion is the limited mental work area. I assume that this is true, supported by the related studies, makes me feel that we should write code as compact as possible, right? - Matijn -- PHP General Mailing List (http://www.php.net/) To unsubscribe, visit: http://www.php.net/unsub.php
