Lex Spoon wrote:

> Then it is utterly pointless to go through putting comments like "a
> LEVariable is a lambda expression variable" and "a LEApplication is a
> lambda expression application".  If you know what a lambda expression
> then you don't want a comment in the subclasses. 
I think that's probably a poor characterisation. Class comments 
shouldn't merely be something like that. They _ought_ to explain the 
purpose and usage, the specifics of any limitations, stuff like that. 
I'm not going to claim that many class comments I've seen (let alone 
written) really meet this.

> 	LargeInteger
> 		LargePositiveInteger
> 		LargeNegativeInteger
> 		
> Sure, put a comment in LargeInteger to say what "large" means.  But a
> comment would be useless in the two subclasses.
I disagree, obviously given my above comments.
LPI should becommented to explain that it represents only positive 
values, that the code may need to create LNIs as a result of 
subtractions, that normalisation may produce SmallIntegers(we recently 
had list messages relating to some confusion about this).
LNI would benefit from explanations of a similar nature but obviously 
LPIs are created asa result of -ve * -ve and all that.

Basically I would claim that there are menaingful and useful comments 
for pretty much any class. When we implement even a trivial class we 
need to remember that it might not be trivial to someone else. Reviews 
ought to be a time when this is checked and 'enforced'.

tim