Re: database systems and organizational intelligence

"Alfredo Novoa" <alfredo_at_ncs.es> wrote in message news:e4330f45.0405270315.638f4939_at_posting.google.com...
> "x" <x-false_at_yahoo.com> wrote in message
news:<40b49336$1_at_post.usenet.com>...
>
> > I think Alfredo calls data the data that is not code (data given as
imput to
> > the code or produced by the code).
>
> No, data produced by processing code is data, but it does not mean
> that code is data.
>
> > In this case I'm curious how he define code (he cannot call it data).
>
> We don't need to do that because dictionaries already exist.
>
> code
> <software> Instructions for a computer in some programming language,
> often machine language. The word "code" is often used to distinguish
> instructions from data (e.g. "The code is marked 'read-only'") whereas
> "software" is used in contrast with "hardware" and may consist of more
> than just code.
>
> http://wombat.doc.ic.ac.uk/foldoc/foldoc.cgi?query=code
>
>
> In computer programming, the word code refers to instructions to a
> computer in a programming language. In this usage, the noun "code"
> typically stands for source code, and the verb "to code" means to
> write source code, to program. This usage may have originated when the
> first symbolic languages were developed and were punched onto cards as
> "codes".
>
> Engineers often use the word "code" to mean a single program. They
> might say "I wrote a code" or "I have two codes". No software engineer
> or computer scientist would say that. They would say "I wrote some
> code" or "I have two programs". Since English allows virtually any
> word to be used as a verb, a programmer, or coder might also say I
> coded a program; but, since a code can stand for multiple concepts,
> that coder might say I hard-coded it right into the program, as
> opposed to the metaprogramming model, which might allow multiple
> re-uses of the same piece of code to accomplish multiple goals. Thus,
> the coder might instead soft-code a concept, which ensures that it
> will have a longer lifespan than a hard-coded concept.
>
> http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Code

And an end-user writing a rule for use in a software application is writing code, then, right? And that code is stored as data. I'm not saying there is no distinction, but it isn't easy to separate data and code into disjoint categories. And it leads to poor design if only "the code" or only "the data" are designed, or even if one team designs one while another designs the other. What's the API between code and data? Data and code are interwoven, interrelated and should be taken together when designing software, in my (current) opinion.
--dawn Received on Thu May 27 2004 - 13:40:21 CEST