Re: Is this a simple, robust, and maintainable design?

in reply to Is this a simple, robust, and maintainable design?

I'd also appreciate some suggestions for improving the system.

I would suggest reversing the logic of variable names starting with 'NOT_'. It can be quite confusing to follow the logic once the whole system becomes pretty complex. So, why not name your states like 'CHECKED', 'VERIFIED', etc. and functions like 'is_checked', 'is_verified', etc. It's much easier to follow the reasoning, IMO. Notice that you don't have variables like 'NOT_BROKEN' or 'NOT_COMPLETE'.

Comment on Re: Is this a simple, robust, and maintainable design?

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Re^2: Is this a simple, robust, and maintainable design? by GrandFather (Saint) on Feb 03, 2011 at 19:56 UTC
'Negating' the NOT states actually implies the next state. The negation of NOT_CHECKED to CHECKED actually makes CHECKED semantically the equivelent of NOT_VERIFIED. I'd change the sense by changing NOT_CHECKED to NEEDS_CHECK to retain the state but to avoid the seeming double negatives scattered through the code. True laziness is hard work	[reply]
Re^3: Is this a simple, robust, and maintainable design? by neodon (Novice) on Feb 03, 2011 at 20:01 UTC
That's pretty insightful. It would be a relatively easy change that would make everything much clearer.	[reply]
Re^2: Is this a simple, robust, and maintainable design? by neodon (Novice) on Feb 03, 2011 at 19:35 UTC
I absolutely agree with you on this. Having negated attributes and then negating them again in conditions is pretty confusing. Thanks for pointing it out!	[reply]

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