--- Damien Doligez <damien.doligez@inria.fr> wrote:

> On Feb 24, 2006, at 14:29, EEK Cooper wrote:
> 
> > Since the behavior was NOT unspecified, it was
> reasonable to assume  
> > that the
> > documentation suffered from a simple typo, and to
> expect the  
> > behavior not to
> > change.
> 
> "It is documented to do something else, so we will
> assume that it's  
> intended
> to do what it does, instead of what the
> documentation says."
> 
> I don't think this is very reasonable.

Expecting the documentation to be beyond flaws or
making it right "by definition" also exposes you to
problems when it just doesn't follow the intent of the
writers.

The fact that the documentation is written in english
and not in a computer language doesn't make it any
less vulnerable to bugs.

If the implementation and documentation diverge, and
both behaviours are equally logic, sound, consistent,
etc. the fact that changing the documentation doesn't
create any regression problems should easily tip the
balance against any change in the implementation.

Regards,


Joaquin Cuenca Abela
e98cuenc at yahoo dot com

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