Reading and Writing Code

Abstract

So far I have discussed the difficultly of understanding code and software, and how it is important to link together the materiality of code with its social practices in order to help us understand it. One of the biggest problems with trying to understand code is finding the right kinds of examples to illustrate this discussion so here I will present some examples of code that will make the code more visible and show why reading code is useful. Across the Internet, there are now countless code snippets and repositories containing sample code that demonstrate everything from ‘Hello, world!’, traditionally the first programming example taught in computer science, to complex database management systems, or even complete operating systems, like Gnu/Linux. Whilst I do want to stress the importance of connecting the dots associated with code and software, I also want to avoid a tedious programming lesson in what can soon become a rather dry subject of discussion. For that reason, I have tried to pick examples that will be either immediately clear as a demonstration of the point I wish to make, or else interesting in their own right. Secondly, I have tried to be clear that when one is discussing code one should be aware that snippets of code can be difficult to understand when taken out of context and often require the surrounding documentation to make sense of it.