I think we have a fundamental difference in assumption about what code is and what it is not. My assumption is that the code I write is not mine in the way that my underwear is mine. I write code that part of a group's work. The stuff I type in will be edited by someone else and I will be editing code that someone else typed in.

With that in mind, I have to try to write my code as strictly as possible. This means turning on all strictures and warnings. Now, I have, do, and will write code with soft references in it, in violation of strict-refs. I have, do, and will write code that needs no warnings 'uninitialized'.

I suspect the difference between you and I is that I am directly accountable to other people. These people are extremely programmers, but I'm still accountable to them. So, I have to demonstrate why I feel that strict-refs or no-warnings is appropriate.

The thing I always return to is that the warning is describing a potential error condition. By turning off warnings, I'm turning off a error-detector. Sometimes, it is annoying, but it's saved my butt at 3am on Saturday more often than I'd care to admit.

My criteria for good software:
  1. Does it work?
  2. Can someone else come in, make a change, and be reasonably certain no bugs were introduced?

In reply to Re^3: On Commenting Out 'use strict;' by dragonchild
in thread On Commenting Out 'use strict;' by Old_Gray_Bear

Title:
Use:  <p> text here (a paragraph) </p>
and:  <code> code here </code>
to format your post, it's "PerlMonks-approved HTML":


  • Posts are HTML formatted. Put <p> </p> tags around your paragraphs. Put <code> </code> tags around your code and data!
  • Titles consisting of a single word are discouraged, and in most cases are disallowed outright.
  • Read Where should I post X? if you're not absolutely sure you're posting in the right place.
  • Please read these before you post! —
  • Posts may use any of the Perl Monks Approved HTML tags:
    a, abbr, b, big, blockquote, br, caption, center, col, colgroup, dd, del, details, div, dl, dt, em, font, h1, h2, h3, h4, h5, h6, hr, i, ins, li, ol, p, pre, readmore, small, span, spoiler, strike, strong, sub, summary, sup, table, tbody, td, tfoot, th, thead, tr, tt, u, ul, wbr
  • You may need to use entities for some characters, as follows. (Exception: Within code tags, you can put the characters literally.)
            For:     Use:
    & &amp;
    < &lt;
    > &gt;
    [ &#91;
    ] &#93;
  • Link using PerlMonks shortcuts! What shortcuts can I use for linking?
  • See Writeup Formatting Tips and other pages linked from there for more info.