Hacker News Reader

I disagree that you shouldn't do it. The way you do it is to add a comment

// This %thing% was generated from %template% using data from %data%.

If your language is too restrictive to add sensible tools, you should write the tools yourself. As with any code, write it in a way such that other people will be able to understand it.

There is no magic, it's just code. I wish people would stop using that word.

View on HN

The original comment says "they just weren't anywhere in the code that humans could see."

Where would you and the comment in a situation like that one?

I don't have anything against generated code but it should be visible and, as you said, it should be crystal clear where it come from

I think in this instance it's also a matter of tools. Visual Studio/Visual Assist would have been able to find the class definition, and that's where the comment would go. For cscope it's a matter of configuration, which should be auto-generated by the build tool.

If the class is being used, then the definition has got to be somewhere, hopefully in a header. It's simply a file that is included somewhere. And it will be human readable. There is no magic.

The class definitions were not in any file. That was the entire point. They didn't exist at all except as transient build artifacts.

Reply on news.ycombinator.com