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From: "Randy Brukardt" <randy@rrsoftware.com>
Newsgroups: comp.lang.ada
Subject: Re: "Usability" (was Re: Map iteration and modification)
Date: Sat, 6 Jan 2024 01:03:05 -0600
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"Lawrence D'Oliveiro" <ldo@nz.invalid> wrote in message 
news:unafcg$bpv5$7@dont-email.me...
> On Thu, 4 Jan 2024 20:00:37 -0600, Randy Brukardt wrote:
>
>> "Dmitry A. Kazakov" <mailbox@dmitry-kazakov.de> wrote in message
>> news:un64o3$3krch$1@dont-email.me...
>>>>
>>>>> Usability always trumps performance.
>>>>
>>>> That's the philosophy of languages like Python, not Ada.
>>>
>>> Ah, this is why Python is totally unusable? (:-))
>>
>> I would tend to argue that it is indeed the case that you get dubious
>> results when you put usability first. ...
>> http://www.rrsoftware.com/html/blog/consequences.html
>
> Without reading that, I would never have understood "usability" to mean
> "ease of writing". I learned from early on in my programming career that
> readability was more important than writability. So "using" a language
> doesn't end with writing the code: you then have to test and debug it--
> basically lick it into shape--then maintain it afterwards.

Usability is of course not just ease-of-writing, but a lot of people tend to 
co-mingle the two. For readability, too little information can be just as 
bad as too much. For writability, the less you have to write, the better.

                   Randy.