[icambron]

It's a textural representation of instructions for a computer; it's certainly code. I think the distinction you're looking for is whether writing HTML/CSS/etc constitutes programming or not. That's a recurring discussion on HN (I've personally come around to the view that it is).

[mikeash]

Seems like a pointless definitional quibble. What matters is that when people see "code" used as a verb in this context on this site, they think of programming. Whether that's "what it means" or not doesn't really matter.

[icambron]

Descriptivism is all well and good, but I don't think your definition of the word is well established, even in this context. Did I miss a vote or something?

What this whole thing sounds like is, "I unilaterally made up my own definition of a word and I will correct people who don't use it that way and everyone who disagrees with me is just quibbling."

And regardless of the relative popularity of that usage, I can't see how I'm the one with the "pointless definitional quibble", since the context is someone calling out the author for using something other than their favorite definition of "code".

[mikeash]

Well, we'd have to poll the HN readership to make sure. However, do you really doubt that such a poll would result in anything better than, say, a 90/10 split in favor of "code means programming"?

I mean, if you do doubt that, that's fair enough. I just thought it was pretty obvious that in this community the word was used in a pretty restrictive way (thus the post complaining about it) and broader meanings were only found elsewhere.

[icambron]

I do doubt that, especially if it were phrased as "Is CSS code?" or similar. Though now I'm curious...

[mikeash]

I'd be interested in seeing the results of a poll either way.

In any case, my point is that even if we nail it down, all we're doing is figuring out what people mean by "code", not discovering any fundamental truths about coding or programming or HTML or anything.

[icambron]

Sure, and I'm not saying otherwise. But I stand by my take that what people (including people on HN) mean by "code" is "text instructions for a computer". That we disagree on that is fine, but I don't think it involves my misunderstanding semantics or any real disagreement about perscriptivism/descriptivism, as you seem to be reading into my comments.