English Idiom in Unix: Directory Recursively

[Thorsten Kampe]

* Rikishi42 (Wed, 25 May 2011 00:06:06 +0200)
> 
> On 2011-05-24, Steven D'Aprano <steve+comp.lang.python at pearwood.info> wrote:
> >>> I think that is a patronizing remark that under-estimates the
> >>> intelligence of lay people and over-estimates the difficulty of
> >>> understanding recursion.
> >> 
> >> Why would you presume this to be related to intelligence? The point was
> >> not about being *able* to understand, but about *needing* to understand
> >> in order to use.
> >
> > Maybe they don't "need" to understand recursion. So what?
> 
> I think you should read the earlier posts again, this is drifting so far
> from what I intended.
> 
> What I mean is: I'm certain that over the years I've had more than one
> person come to me and ask what 'Do you wish to delete this directory
> recursively?' meant. BAut never have I been asked to explain what 'Do you
> wish to delete this directory and it's subdirs/with all it's contents?'
> meant. Never.

Naming something in the terms of its implementation details (in this 
case recursion) is a classical WTF.

On the other hand, it's by far not the only WTF in Unix. For instance, 
how often have you read "unlink" instead of "delete"? Or "directory" 
instead of "folder", pointing out that "directory" is the correct term 
because a directory is just a listing and does not "contain" the actual 
files. Of course these implementation details will never matter to 
anyone except under the rarest conditions.

Thorsten