User talk:Panic2k4/Archive1

monolithic versions
Hi Panic. I thought you might be interested to see how the Computer Science:Data Structures book has an Computer Science:Data Structures:All Chapters view of the book, which gives a monolithic version of the same book. As you can see this is accomplished through transclusion. I've made special _content pages for each chapter, so that way there can be a view of the book that is chapter by chapter with a navigation bar, and a view of the book that is all chapters, without navigation bars. I think it would be a good idea to start doing this for the C++ book, so that the C -/- -/- book won't be necessary. MShonle 21:01, 7 September 2005 (UTC)

Fork Warning
Since this issue has been brought to my attention I have reviewed the forking policy. The separate books Programming:C plus plus and Programming:C -/- -/- will be merged into a single book. The monolithic book versus separate chapters conflict shall be resolved by including an All Chapters page that is a transclusion of all of the sub-modules (as I've described above). The book Programming:C -/- -/- and its subpages will be deleted in two weeks (roughly around September 21, 2005). You can request the material can be available (in some form) for a period longer than the two weeks.

Forking can harm Wikibooks in that it divides the community effort into producing a Wikibook, essentially lengthening the time it creates to finish a Wikibook and creating redundant information. This policy aims to encourage community cooperation, unify contributor effort, and reduce the amount of redundant material on Wikibooks.

It is against policy to fork and any re-creations of the same module (or similar) will become a candidate for speedy deletion. I think it's unfortunate that concensus couldn't have been reached on this issue that had a technical solution. I encourage you to keep on contributing to the C++ book and I appologize that for a long time you have been sent mixed and ambiguous messages from the Wikibooks administration. I hope that we can serve you better by being more consistent with the application of our policies. MShonle 02:18, 8 September 2005 (UTC)

Panic, I appreciate that you are working on the merge, however I must ask you to stop using the name Programming in C -/- -/- or any other name that uses those hyphens and slashes. The correct name to use is "plus plus". I've move-protected the pages now so you will not be able to revert. MShonle 18:58, 10 September 2005 (UTC)

LISP
BTW, what do you have against Lisp? Both Scheme and CLOS are quite excellent. :-) --MShonle 01:20, 11 September 2005 (UTC)

Lisp is hard to write, the logic is hard to fallow and reading in not so easy also, the major problem is there aren't any good IDEs for the language, as for Scheme I have not used it but have looked at it, it seems to provide more ease of use but again at the time I didn't find a compiler for it, a problem I have with Scheme is that it is being used as an introductory language in many Universities in place of Pascal and C... CLOS I don't know at all... (I'll check it out)--Panic 01:55, 11 September 2005 (UTC)
 * A great Scheme environment is PLT Scheme (the site also has references to great books, although the real classic book is The Structure and Interpretation of Computer Programs, also available on the web). I've seen some hard to follow Scheme programs, but then again, I've seen hard to follow programs in any language that I've had to work with. I recommend you start reading SICP... after the first 150 pages your mind might be blown. :-)
 * I think the first undergraduate course in programming should be Scheme, just as Berkeley, UofChicago, and MIT do. I TAed this introductory Java course last year, and I have to say that most of the time was wasted on little details, such as the difference between while and for, or what break is, or that super-constructors are called by default, or what public, private, and protected are. These are important concepts, but they missed the whole idea of what abstraction was. Learning Scheme, on the other hand, all you really have to work with is abstraction. The language itself is much simpler and that forces you to write better abstractions. I think for the second course students should learn all of the little details of the current "fad" language. So C++ or Java is appropriate then, but only after they learned abstraction, not Programming Complex Things Through a Bunch of Complex Examples and Exceptions I've Seen. MShonle 02:54, 11 September 2005 (UTC)

Minor Edits
Panic,

I have noticed that all your edits are flagged as "minor". Is that indendet? because i believe adding a new comment to a discussion is not minor. What is your view on minor / non-minor edits? --Max 16:44, 23 September 2005 (UTC)

Programming:C plus plus/Charter
I edited the charter page of the "C plus plus" book to use a table and some fancy-shmancy CSS. This way the text will automatically center in each browser, and doesn't depend on the resolution or the size of the browser window. If you don't like the change, you are free to revert it and it won't hurt my feelings at all. I also just used some simple grayscale coloring, so you can change that as well if you want some more "pizzaz". -- 21:21, 8 December 2005 (UTC)

Page renaming
I see you are discussing renaming of C++ book. If you want to have a tool making such renaming automatic, please visit Staff lounge and sign your support vote. Today we have to move all pages manually and then fix all the links. tsca.bot does it automatically. --Derbeth talk 19:45, 13 January 2006 (UTC)

Deleting pages
When you are attempting to delete pages, I would like to ask you to use the markup template   instead of blanking the page. Page blanking is more commonly used by vandals, and it is harder for us to keep track of where everything is at when you do that. It also allows us to review the content of the page for a second opinion as to if it was legitimate to remove the content.

BTW, thanks for trying to help clean up Wikibooks. That is appreciated. --Rob Horning 18:52, 23 January 2006 (UTC)

C++ Programming/All Chapters
I noticed you reverted my small change and added a print friendly version, however there was one already at C++ Programming/Print so now there's a duplicate. Your version is more maintainable since it includes from the other page which is good, I was thinking though, one page would make more sense for people who have a slow connection since having to go to yet another page would require long waiting again. Is your issue with the licence and print template? The print template could be removed and the license could be made to show up only when printed that way on screen it would look just as it does now yet includes the license when printed. --darklama 17:27, 16 September 2006 (UTC)

I use the monolithic version to get the feel of the flow of the work, check the basic format, see duplications, stuff out of order and from time to time run a spell check see that wikipedia links are done only once (and in reading order), if you can remove the toc and the license on a single page and provide the license on printing of the page I don't have any objection...--Panic 22:49, 16 September 2006 (UTC)

I noticed you readded Multi Paradigm chapter. Did you not notice that it was removed because I added its contents to Programming Paradigms once I cleaned up that chapter? So now the contents is on All Chapters twice. --darklama 04:09, 18 September 2006 (UTC)

Sorry its been hard to keep up with your esthetic changes to the book, the chapters are to be split into smaller parts not aggregated, btw I feel very strongly about the use of the phrase "The statically-typed free-form multi-paradigm programming language" it was used in a sub chapter but as your changes have removed the by point explanation, I would like to keep it in the main since C++ is a statically-typed free-form multi-paradigm programming language and chapter one deals in explaining what C++ is...--Panic 10:34, 18 September 2006 (UTC)

I have no intension of combining everything into one big page, thats what All Chapters is for. I do though see no need to split one concept across different pages if there small, as was the case with Programming Paradigm and Multi Paradigm. I think "statically-typed free-form multi-paradigm programming language" is a bit long for a chapter/section/part name and only one chapter explains what this is. I used "What is Programming?" because the chapters in this section/part deal for the most part with general programming concepts not tied to a specific programming language. My changes for the most part are esthetic right now, because I'm trying to clean up whats already there, by rearrange, clarifying and removing duplicate explanations, before adding new material.

BTW, I see you didn't like my changes to the names of the appendixes because I used C++ in their names. I did that for people printing out the wikibook, so that on paper it would be easier to tell it belongs to a book on C++. I think "Internal References" and "External References" didn't make much since either. Whats in "External References" isn't references at all, but resources for tools, websites and books, which is why I had changed it to "C++ Resources", then there was no need to make a distinction between "External" and "Internal". I changed "Source Code Examples" to "C++ Examples" because I don't think there needs to be emphases on the examples being source code. I didn't change "Extra Concepts" because I'm not sure that these things should even be part of this wikibook, maybe different wikibooks and linked to from the Resources appendix. --darklama 15:12, 18 September 2006 (UTC)

I haven't said that it was your intention but that was "our" intention (editors) as specified under the conventions, to reduce page sizes, I had done a bit of the indexing of what was on each part to the "main" page, up-to the classes...

I do agree that "statically-typed free-form multi-paradigm programming language" is a bit long and I don't like a separation of the book in Parts like Basic and Advanced, I can live with the separation in parts but I strongly object to the removal of the phrase being evident on the book/toc. It was my intention of voting for the rename of the book in a future stage (there is old cover image)...

The "Internal References" are the reference pages already included on the book, no more no less, they were on an Appendix just to give some logic structure and be easier to see.

"External References" is self evident, it refers to any non wikibook reference, some are real references some are just resources but as people tend to add to that list it's just easier to aggregate all there, I don't like to see IRC channels under Web References as you have done but I can live with it.

I will reformat the changes you made on the examples to preserve the navigation, but they will still exist under the /examples/ ...

As for the use of "C++", I try to hunt down every extra use of the qualifier since it's self evident that the content is about C++ and removing it can make parts of the book easier to use on other works, and it's just visually UGLY to see it repeated over and over, and saves space in wikibooks :) ...

ie: "the C++ programming language" -> "the programming language" "C++ objects" -> "objects" etc...

Btw I didn't like your over-simplification of the Paradigms part, you removed some logical steps that exist on the original "wikipedia" article that gives the reader not only the evolution of the concepts but removes the identification of layers of the OOP model that can of use to the coder/reader... In C++ we are free to do as we like, that was the NPOV that the "statically-typed free-form multi-paradigm programming language" phrase transmits, many people argues that we should use only one model, I for one like to mix all as to produce the simpler solution to problems...--Panic 19:10, 18 September 2006 (UTC)

Not all pages listed under "Internal References" are included on some page like is claimed. I didn't add IRC channels to Weblinks, someone else did. I simply think based on how "External References" is currently being used, it makes more sense to refer to the contents as a collection of resources rather then as a reference. I don't have a problem with "C++" being removed from the contents of the pages, I think it just makes sense in the title of the Appendixes. By making the pages under "Getting Started" more general and more of an introduction to general programming concepts less reference to "C++" should be needed to make clear weither whats being discussed is specific to C++ or not.

My intention was to simplify the explanations of the different paradigms used by C++, while waiting to get into the specifics of how C++ implements the OOP layers or other programming concepts until later chapters. I don't have a problem with identifing and explaining different programming modules if they are explained in more general terms in "Programming Paradigms" and/or fully explaining in later chapters, such as in the "Object and Object-Oriented Programming" section, once the C++ OOP concepts thats relied on have been explained. This way concepts aren't explained twice and readers aren't forced to jump around in the text in order to understand whats being said, which just looks ugly to me. I hope you understand my issue was not with the different layers of the OOP model being explained, but with when and where its explained. --darklama 22:04, 18 September 2006 (UTC)

Sorry but all pages listed under "Internal References" are included on some page like is claimed on the index, or they were when I've added and listed them ... I didn't say you have added non web links to the web resources in the "External References", but I've noticed that you named them as "web" references in one of your edits... Is there a technical text that doesn´t involve the readers to jump around in the text in order to understand concepts ? tech. books aren't to be read like a novel, most are used as reference books, some parts are for and needed to beginners and others are needed to refresh even the most experienced user or one that was using a similar technology or just to keep up with need concepts. Of course that a logical structure must be enforced but for instance I really don't agree in moving the debugging concept to the end of the book any beginner needs to know how to do it and for what purpose... What hirks me is that as you say "I'm trying to clean up whats already there, by rearrange, clarifying and removing duplicate explanations, before adding new material.", you surely understand that as the only editor that has been contributing to the book in a non-punctual way, I tend to see it as mostly "my" work, and it is with some pain that I see you doing major restructuring without contributing real content or debating the matter, even removing or shuffling parts that I see as important, I agree that this is a community effort but you can also try to see it from my point of view.--Panic 22:16, 20 September 2006 (UTC)

Could you be more specific on what edit(s) involving "External References" your referring to? I'm not sure what you mean and its hard for me to address them without context (a history link would be helpful). I agree technical text books are used by all kinds of audiences from beginners to the more experienced as references, to learn from and to refresh on and are not novels. I was speaking of some logical structure in which concepts are built on one another in some natural flow when speaking of not having to jump around. I think first time readers may have some trouble understanding this wikibook and those readers who are trying to refresh or use this wikibook as a reference may have trouble quickly finding what it is they are looking for. This is why my focus right now is not on adding much in the way of new material. I mean no offense to you and everyone else who has contributed their time, energy and work on this wikibook. I see this as just being a common accurance of an incomplete/unfinished work.

I have added lots of redirects from Programming:C plus plus that are no longer referenced to speedy deletion in hopes of making it easier to find what remaining information is under this wikibook name, so that it may be moved to the "C++ Programming" wikibook if appropriate. All the redirects make it a bit hard to locate the trees from the forest, so this should make it easier. --darklama 17:47, 21 September 2006 (UTC)

The merge is completed, all of the Programming:C plus plus should have been deleted some time ago at least 2 people said they would do it, it seems none did... but if you can now mark them for deletion at least someone removed the write protection ,see the discussion area for more info... --Panic 18:53, 21 September 2006 (UTC)

Ya I saw some of the discussion area where it said it would be done which seemed dated and I could see they were still present for whatever reason. The discussion area is a bit disoragnized and is hard for me to tell what still applies or not. I decided to go ahead and at lest attempt to get deleted, what looks like could be safely deleted. Some pages are still locked however, perhaps this is the time to try to get that changed. --darklama 20:10, 21 September 2006 (UTC)