Subj : Re: curve for verbosity in a language
To   : comp.programming
From : Vesa Karvonen
Date : Sun Aug 07 2005 04:07 am

Vesa Karvonen <vesa.karvonen@cs.helsinki.fi> wrote:

I have one more thing to add and then I will stop posting to this thread.

[...]
> > No. Token count is also subject to personal style. For example:
[...snip two *semantically equivalent* Ocaml function definitions...]
> The token counts differ by 17% and the line counts differ by 67%.

> However, let's look at a more interesting example:
[...snip two *identical* Ocaml function definitions...]
> Between the above definitions there is no difference in token counts
> and the line counts differ by 80%.

According to the LOC metric, Ocaml can be 67% to 80% more verbose than
Ocaml. This is as reliable and as objective as it gets, because the
figures are based on "just the best" metric that Jon has "come up with"
(in *his own words*), although even he admits that it is still "highly
subjective".

(My point: *LOC is fundamentally broken as a metric of verbosity*.)

-Vesa Karvonen

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