C programmers commit fresh crimes against readability
Bender
126 points
19 comments
July 06, 2026
Related Discussions
Found 5 related stories in 898.2ms across 14,015 title embeddings via pgvector HNSW
- C programmers commit fresh crimes against readability jjgreen · 13 pts · July 05, 2026 · 100% similar
- Programming Still Sucks jeromechoo · 257 pts · May 06, 2026 · 56% similar
- My 1992 view of the problems of computer programming in 1992 pavel_lishin · 31 pts · June 21, 2026 · 53% similar
- Why is this program erroneously rejected by three C++ compilers? tornikeo · 24 pts · March 14, 2026 · 53% similar
- How to Write Unmaintainable Code (1999) downbad_ · 35 pts · April 03, 2026 · 53% similar
Discussion Highlights (4 comments)
anthk
On the subleq VM, it would run faster if they implemented Muxleq, but it woudn't win the IOCCC contest maybe. Altough in unobfuscated it's C it's just an extra short if clause with two more lines. On 32k roms for the GB emulator: https://github.com/tbsp/Adjustris Old build: https://pdroms.de/?__df=24010f101611170c163a13544b55553a4d22... Someone ping back the IOCCC creator, please.
RicoElectrico
> Nixie tube is a tiny electrical tube with filaments in the shapes of all the digits stacked one on top of another, and it displays the desired digit by making just that filament glow Lol, no. That's a Numitron (although they were 7 segment)
Refreeze5224
I wonder at what level you could enforce/how far you could take the idea of "don't allow invalid states to be represented" to a programming language, to prevent this kind of language debauchery. C does seem to sit at the perfect intersection of language age and low-level access to allow this kind of competition, whereas something like Go seems far less suited for it. Javascript is routinely obfuscated pretty well for human readers. I'm not familiar enough with Rust to say, but I bet with what little I know of its syntax you could create some pretty ugly stuff?
russfink
TL;DR: the one entry implemented a subleq machine. Google it - it’s a One Instruction Set Computer (OISC). This made me smile. But it also raised a question: when were OISC’s first conceived? Would Apollo and computers of that era have benefitted from this insight?