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1-based indexing is great. It's just _different_ - from C, where the array index is just sugar for pointer arithmetic, and from other languages which borrowed the practice without reasoning.

by bajsejohannes13 hours ago|

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There are arguments for why 0-based indexing is _better_, unrelated to pointer arithmetic. https://www.cs.utexas.edu/~EWD/transcriptions/EWD08xx/EWD831...

> we had better regard —after all those centuries!— zero as a most natural number

Of course, a counter argument is that we've already made the mistake of indexing with 1 in natural language (first, second, ...). That decision is not free of annoyances, though: the 19th century are year numbers 18xx, floors below the first have a varying names when they could have been negative numbers, etc.

by ufo12 hours ago|

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That EWD is one if my pet peeves. Dijkstra makes an unfair comparison because he lists plenty of examples where 0-based indexing is more convenient but ignores the equally numerous situations where 1-based is more convenient. For example, iterating backwards over an array is much better in an 1-based world.

I like the argument that 1-based is better for indexing and 0-based is better for offsets: https://hisham.hm/2021/01/18/again-on-0-based-vs-1-based-ind...

by bajsejohannes10 hours ago|

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To be honest, I actually agree that Dijkstra's argument seem a bit one sided. It's also interesting to see the argument in your linked article that offset and index doesn't have to be the same.

If I get the root of the argument in the linked article, it is that zero-based indexing is more of a optimization than anything, but I would disagree; there are reasons beyond that (see the examples in my previous comment).

Also, here's an example of an 1-index based system that has caused me some headaches: In music theory, the first note of the scale is called the "first", etc. It also talks about e.g. "stacking thirds", which means take the third of the scale, than take the third from there. However, the offsets are two. (first=offset 0, second=offset 1, third=offset 2). Which is hard to work with in my opinion.

You have an interesting argument about iterating backwards, although I would say; if we need a tie-breaker between the two, iterating forward should have more weight than backwards.

I appreciate your comment, and while trying as best I can to be convinced of the "other side", I still land on 0-indexing. The only argument I buy, is that it matches our natural language starting at 1. Which, of course, is a strong argument.

by raincole18 hours ago|

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The reasoning is to be consistent with C and it's more than enough reasoning for me. I don't know if 1-based indexing is fundamentally better. However, I know the probability that I will need to use other languages in the future is 100%, and they'll use 0-based index.

It's like right-click-to-select.