Comments, with reply, on "On criteria for module interfaces" by D. Hoffman

The commenter acknowledges that the practical criteria provided in the above-titled paper (see ibid., vol.16, no.5, p.537-42, 1990), offer substantive guidelines for designing module interfaces. He points out that the results obtained can be further improved and certain remaining conflicts resolved through consideration of established principles of structured design and software engineering. He illustrates his point with an example involving the specification of a stack interface that requires two or three separate references to replace one. He presents two designs and argues that the first is better. The author refutes the commenter's arguments and argues that the second design is better.<
>