Good point; I assume you're going to emphasize the pitfalls of dynamic patching while you're at it, Derek? I have a habit of opening up patches to see how they work, and if I can't read them because they're too messy, I'll move stuff around. This is fine, unless it's a dynamic patch and I hit "ctrl-s" without thinking. D'oh! The initial state of a dynamic patch is critical to its correct function, and one has to think very carefully before saving changes. I think I'm going to develop the habit of putting a large warning comment on any self-modifying patch.
Phil
IOhannes m zmoelnig wrote:
however, my experiences with abcde were the main reason i s did not touch self-modifying patches for years and years. the lesson i learned was: never do self-modification in patches that other people will ever have to regularily use. (the original phrase would have been "never do self-modification in patches that other people will ever have to maintain"; however, this might give the impression that chances are low that somebody else will really have to "maintain" a patch); in practice you pass maintainership to somebody as soon as you give them your patch: they will eventually start to modify it.