this post was submitted on 17 Jan 2024
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Programming

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Algorithms instead of source code !! (lemmy.world)
submitted 10 months ago* (last edited 10 months ago) by [email protected] to c/[email protected]
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Disclaimer : I am a hobbyist programmer, I have not gone to Uni for that , so I might not know everything I am talking about.

My question is why don't open source programs include something like diagrams of the algorithms they employ ?? I Was looking for algorithms for a chat program with client-server architecture, I was hoping to find diagrams and descriptions of how algorithms work, so a to study them an adapt them to my needs. All I found were FOSS projects with no such documentation.

Considering that reading source code can take a long time, and sometimes interesting projects are written in a language the user isn't familiar with, I was wondering why such documentation style doesn't exist ? It could help even newer contributors get started quicker.

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[–] [email protected] 14 points 10 months ago

Being able to document the exact algorithms used to solve a problem is sort of a 'Holy Grail' in programming. Most programmers aren't afforded the time to document to that level. This would require refining the code down to a single cohesive story that describes the functionality of the implementation. It's great when you can spend the time on it, but the problem is that the code is actually "working" long before that point. Most employers want to stop paying for code after it starts working.