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2.9 KiB
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20 lines
2.9 KiB
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<html xmlns="http://www.w3.org/1999/xhtml"><head><title>considered harmful</title><link rel="stylesheet" href="../../jargon.css" type="text/css"/><meta name="generator" content="DocBook XSL Stylesheets V1.61.0"/><link rel="home" href="../index.html" title="The Jargon File"/><link rel="up" href="../C.html" title="C"/><link rel="previous" href="cons.html" title="cons"/><link rel="next" href="console.html" title="console"/></head><body><div class="navheader"><table width="100%" summary="Navigation header"><tr><th colspan="3" align="center">considered harmful</th></tr><tr><td width="20%" align="left"><a accesskey="p" href="cons.html">Prev</a><EFBFBD></td><th width="60%" align="center">C</th><td width="20%" align="right"><EFBFBD><a accesskey="n" href="console.html">Next</a></td></tr></table><hr/></div><dt><a id="considered-harmful"/><dt xmlns="" id="considered-harmful"><b>considered harmful</b>: <span xmlns="http://www.w3.org/1999/xhtml" class="grammar">adj.</span></dt></dt><dd><p> [very common] Edsger W. Dijkstra's note in the March 1968
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<i class="citetitle">Communications of the ACM</i>, <i class="citetitle">Goto Statement
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Considered Harmful</i>, fired the first salvo in the structured
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programming wars (text at <a href="http://www.acm.org/classics/" target="_top">http://www.acm.org/classics/</a>).
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As it <a href="http://www.theregister.co.uk/content/4/26585.html" target="_top"> turns
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out</a>, the title under which the letter appeared was actually
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supplied by CACM's editor, Niklaus Wirth. Amusingly, the ACM considered
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the resulting acrimony sufficiently harmful that it will (by policy) no
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longer print an article taking so assertive a position against a coding
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practice. (Years afterwards, a contrary view was uttered in a CACM letter
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called, inevitably, <i class="citetitle">‘Goto considered harmful’
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considered harmful'</i>'. In the ensuing decades, a large number
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of both serious papers and parodies have borne titles of the form
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<i class="citetitle">X considered Y</i>. The structured-programming wars
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eventually blew over with the realization that both sides were wrong, but
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use of such titles has remained as a persistent minor in-joke (the
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‘considered silly’ found at various places in this lexicon is
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related).</p></dd><div class="navfooter"><hr/><table width="100%" summary="Navigation footer"><tr><td width="40%" align="left"><a accesskey="p" href="cons.html">Prev</a><EFBFBD></td><td width="20%" align="center"><a accesskey="u" href="../C.html">Up</a></td><td width="40%" align="right"><EFBFBD><a accesskey="n" href="console.html">Next</a></td></tr><tr><td width="40%" align="left" valign="top">cons<EFBFBD></td><td width="20%" align="center"><a accesskey="h" href="../index.html">Home</a></td><td width="40%" align="right" valign="top"><EFBFBD>console</td></tr></table></div></body></html>
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