Subject: Re: [PATCH 0/6] doc: replace "alice" and "bob" examples

From: Phillip Susi <[email-masked]>
Date: Thu, 17 Jun 2021 11:48:00 -0400

Felipe Contreras <[email-masked]> writes:

> I have not read cryptography documentation, so for me Alice and Bob are
> simply two illustrative colleagues.

I have read cryptography documentation and seen Alice and Bob used
commonly.  Am I supposed to be confused if I see those names used in
documentation for non cryptographic software?  If Alice and Bob work
there, why should they not be used here?  Am I missing something?

>> And as argued in 1/6 for those users who /are/ aware of "Alice and Bob"
>> it's needless distraction. Maybe it's just me, but whenever I read
>> references to them I keep waiting for the cryptography angle to be
>> introduced. None of the uses in our documentation reflect that canonical
>> usage.
>
> It's probably not just you, but the vast majority of readers are
> likely not aware of any cryptographic reference.

I find it surprising that anyone would be upset that the names Alice and
Bob were being used in a non cryptographic context.

>> There's also just weird things in our documentation fixed by this
>> series, such as referring to a random file tracked by git as "bob"
>> instead of the more obvious "file.txt".
>
> OK, _that_ I agree it's unequivocally an improvement.

Yea, a file probably shouldn't be called bob... I would probably have
gone with "foo.txt" ( but file.txt is just fine too ).