Writing code is a feedback loop

It seems traditionally programming is seen as an activity where you make the computer do what you want. You have some requirements for the program, and then you write code to make it do the thing. It’s a linear “one way” process which you repeat until the program works. But I don’t think it’s a linear one way progress, where you only insert things into the computer. Instead, it’s a feedback loop, where the programming language and the programming environment actively shapes your idea and approach, in response to how you write your program. This post is an exploration of the idea that programming languages and related tools affect how we write code. How they provide feedback to us, and how this changes the way we express ourselves in code, and how this ultimately affects things like how easy a program is to maintain or extend. Intelligent activity feeds back to your understanding of it Programming languages and other related tools provide you feedback as you use them. There are two…