But having something like a comic where it's both visual and communicative in a more conversational/narrative way could prove pretty effective. Also if you can throw some humour in there, it could potentially add even more comprehensibility, etc.
Thanks for sharing!
If the goal is to encourage rubber-stamping by bystanders, it might help.
This seems to take dumbing-down beyond any sensible level.
It was difficult to parse even as someone who's familiar with these concepts, and I think it will hurt more than help any newbies.
I think it's a little whimsical, perhaps too much for what info it conveys (a bullet list with the same component names would probably be equally informative), but I thought it was easy to understand and follow. I think there is -something- here; I don't need THIS comic but if it was more about the context and goals of the change then maybe that would be powerful. Especially if it was consistently done over many PRs.
RULES OF HOORS?
Updste #2: setState
Starts wite hooks!At which point I feel like I would rather the human have invested their time into writing a design doc that we could discuss well before they submitted a PR.
I thought that was just due to it being about React.
I asked it to generate a comic for https negotiation over tcp https://imgur.com/a/0p0Pzum I think with a bit more prodding it might be interesting for documenting protocols
BTW, amazing they chose a review that exemplifies why hooks are a horrible horrible mistake for public API.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Comics_Code_Authority
I know this is hacker news but you do get all sorts posted here, that's my excuse.
I would suspect there's lots of overlap between the comic book collector/reader and hacker demographics anyway.
JonathanAquino•2mo ago
The blog post shows an example generated from a real PR: summarizing the changes, anthropomorphizing the components, and making the flow visually obvious. It’s meant to help reviewers grasp intent quickly and make reviews a bit more fun.
Curious whether others have tried visual or narrative aids in their review process, and whether this could be practical for real teams.
treetalker•2mo ago
Sadly, the fun would end with a reprimand or sanctions order. Cf. https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=43866303 ("Don't watermark your legal PDFs with purple dragons in suits").
Might work for bringing associate attorneys up to speed in a new case, or for teaching concepts to law students, though!
ChrisMarshallNY•2mo ago
Not sure if it would be used, though. Being on HN front page helps.
It would also have to contain a lot of content, and be indexed well.
guitarbill•2mo ago
shermantanktop•2mo ago
I’ve been guilty of injecting bits of whimsy, sarcasm, and other unserious behaviors in a corporate We Mean Business environment.
I’ve toned it down because I recognize some people are very resistant to seeing both the serious and humorous aspects of a situation at the same time.
justinclift•2mo ago
But, the actual concepts communicated need to be clear. In your example strip here, it doesn't seem to be meeting that bar for a reviewer. :(
Keep at it though, as I get the feeling this is the kind of thing that will work after a few important "aha!" ideas and tweaks happen to the generating process. :)
klooney•2mo ago
moritzwarhier•2mo ago
As far as I know, the order of hook calls is important to link them to the correct components: the important point of the linked list is not the ordering of built-in hooks depending ob name.
Although it's true that useEffect runs code after render. The picture places useReducer after useEffect, which would not even make sense in this interpretation?
Could be that I'm misremembering details, but I find it more interesting to read, for example, a good description, when a PR is large, dense, or hard to understand.
In the case of hooks, this blog post was good:
https://overreacted.io/why-do-hooks-rely-on-call-order/
I'm not sure whether the explanation in the picture is useful to anyone who doesn't already know the information.
Same issue with most AI-generated doc-blocks I've seem, often misleading, or explaining the obvious, instead of the "why".