[Literate programming][LP] is a philosophy of computer programming
based on the premise that a computer program should be written similar
to literature, with human readability as a primary goal.

Traditional programs have human language comments interspersed in
computer language code.  Literate programs reverse this style, with
computer language "comments" interspersed in a human language essay.

An excellent (and simple) literate programming tool is [noweb][].
There is a hello-world example and some intro information on [Wikipedia][].
There are also official [quick][] and [6 page][] introductions.

[LP]: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Literate_programming
[noweb]: http://www.eecs.harvard.edu/nr/noweb/
[Wikipedia]: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Noweb
[quick]: http://www.eecs.harvard.edu/nr/noweb/onepage.ps
[6 page]: http://www.linuxjournal.com/article/2188

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