Asynchronous and Synchronous: keep it simple

Pat Helland wrote in a recent post: Asynchronous and Synchronous are Subjective Terms.

Pat says that one communication line may be synchronous AND asynchronous depending on which "with respect to". That's the trick: it depends on your viewpoint like every observation in life depends on your viewpoint. I would say: Keep It Simple. Choose a viewpoint and then ask yourself: Do I wait for an answer? Yes: synchronous. No, I am done: asynchronous. If it's about one single communication stack: first choose the layer, then decide.

It drives Pat kinda nuts - as he says himself - when he hears somebody say "such-and-so is asynchronous"... or synchronous. The opposite applies to me: if somebody can't tell me whether his communication is synchronous or asynchronous I push him to the end to get it out. Because it matters to the design...