Perhaps it’s a rather innocuous practice, but after seeing one too many I am compelled to rant a bit, if only to be a total jerk. What do I speak of? I was going through the blogs in my blog reader the other day and I started noticing the predilection for geek blogs to have “cute” titles and/or subtitles with code snippets. I know we’re geeks, but must we be THAT geeky? It’s become so trendy that I must start the backlash now.
Since I know he can take some good natured ribbing, let’s start with my friend, Jon Galloway.
Title: JonGalloway.ToString()
Is the ToString() really necessary? Seriously. Isn’t the title of your blog already a string? Hopefully the compiler optimizes this redundancy away.
Title: {public virtual blog}
Next we have Ryan Farley’s virtual blog. Does a virtual blog imply that you’re not the one writing it, or that you feel your thoughts aren’t concrete? Perhaps the text we see really isn’t there, but are mere wisps of our imagination?
I’m sorry, but the title of your blog just doesn’t compile. Where is the implementation, the member name, and the getter? Perhaps you meant:
public abstract Blog MyBlog {get;}
Even so, you left yourself open for someone else to override your blog.
Title: protected virtual void jaysonBlog {A conduit to the voices in my head.}
Another virtual blog, but at least this one is protected. Unfortunately, it doesn’t compiled (yes, I tried). And here I thought you were spreading better practices for C# coding.
Title: `(joe (@ (version "2.0")) ,(mk-blog))
Subtitle: (define (mk-blog) (lambda () (begin (call/cc brain) (mk-blog))))
Joe Duffy couldn’t simply use a language we can all recognize. Nooooooo, he had to take it to the next level and go all the way to LISP. Does your mom read your blog? And does she worry that you spend too much time with the computer after seeing that title?
Title: Bob Yexley Net
Subtitle: -- SELECT * FROM [bobs].[brain] WHERE category IN (SELECT title FROM [blog_Categories])
And lest we leave out you DBAs, here is some SQL code from the subtitle of Bob’s blog. Good going Bob!
So as it is now apparent by now, my lashing out is merely a response to my own feeling of geek inadequacy when faced with true geekdom. In order to join the geek big leagues, I hereby re-title my blog...
.method public hidebysig static string YouHaveBeen() cil managed
{
.maxstack 1
.locals init (
string title)
L_0000: ldstr "Haacked"
L_0005: stloc.0
L_0006: br.s L_0008
L_0008: ldloc.0
L_0009: ret
}
I hope I am worthy.