Wednesday, 11 September 2024

The Slip Knot Analogy

If you have ventured into knot-tying in any capacity at all, you may have encountered this term: slip knot. Not the band Slipknot, which is a different animal altogether.

Slip knots are knots that have their finished ends doubled back for an easy and quick release. Almost every other knot, especially hitches, can be effectively turned into slip knots. Here's a few YouTube tutorials from WhyKnot.

Slip Reef Knot



Slip Clove Hitch



Slip Sheetbend



In each and every one of these cases, just tugging on the end releases the knot quickly. Definitely quicker and less messy than untying the knot in the old fashioned way, especially if it's been cinched on tight.

What do slipknots remind me of in programming?

Why, the good old Guard Clause, of course. That's when you put an If block right at the start of a function, method or subroutine, to exit early if certain conditions are met, so that no further time needs to be spent processing the request.

Here's an example in Python.
def average(lst):
    if len(list) === 0: return null

    total = 0

    for (item in lst):
         total += item

    return total / len(lst)


And here be the Guard Clauses.
def average(lst):
    if len(lst) === 0: return null
    if len(lst) === 1: return lst[0]


    total = 0

    for (item in lst):
         total += item

    return total / len(lst)


Visually they look nothing like knots, slip knots or otherwise. But functionally? Almost a perfect match.

The Guard Clauses, when triggered, enable a quick and early release from the procedure. The same way tugging on the doubled end of a slip knot releases the knot quickly.

Forget me knot,
T___T

No comments:

Post a Comment