Glossary for Comments

A Glossary for Program Comments

A wise man (whose name I cannot remember) once wrote: A beginner doesn't use comments. An intermediate user uses comments to explain what he did. An expert uses comments to explain what he did NOT do.

Contents 1 What goes in comments? 2 Glossary 2.1 A 2.2 L 2.3 M 2.4 O 2.5 P 2.6 S 2.7 U

What goes in comments?

• Gibberish
• Idiolect http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Idiolect
• Natural Language: Albanian, Chinense, Danish, English, French, German, etc.
• Poetry
• PseudoCode http://www.cs.cornell.edu/Courses/cs482/2003su/handouts/pseudocode.pdf

Glossary

A

• allocate, v.

1. choose variable name
2. assign value to variable

• assign, v.,

L

• lookup table, n., a table with a Primary Key that contains columns with text explanations;

fact tables are linked to lookup tables with FactTable.ForeignKey = LookUpTable.PrimaryKey; database term: dimension table; SAS shortcut: formats;

M

• make

O

• order, v., by-var,

P

• partition,

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Partition_%28database%29

S

• set,
  • n., a list of items,
  • v., to assign

• stratify, v., to arrange, to order, to stack: use by-var with procedures; proc freq cross-tab: tables A * B;

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Stratify

U

• unique, to make unique: proc sort data = ... noduprecs|nodupkey; by by-var(s);

--macro maven == the radical programmer 14:51, 13 June 2008 (EDT)