macrakis@harvard.ARPA (Stavros Macrakis) (06/12/85)
Why must we have flaming on net.lang?: > >> .... This is what the Ada people need to drive through their > >> skulls: we don't want another COBOL or Pascal! (No personal > >> offence to "Ada people".) `Drive through their skulls' is vulgar and offensive, whatever you say. `Another COBOL or Pascal' is meaninglessly vague. > ...he understands that C has more raw power... `Understands' is condescending and offensive. I think you mean `agrees'. A bulldozer has more `raw power' than a dental drill; does that make it better for drilling teeth? What do you mean by `raw power', anyway? Access to low-level operations? Look up unchecked_conversion and the rest of chapter 13 in Ada. You can straightforwardly do random pointer operations etc. in Ada when you need to. > ... and that the reasons for preferring Ada are managerial ... Ada presents advantages especially for large problems developed by groups over long periods, but such notions as packages, types, generics, exceptions, tasks, aggregates, etc. have applicability to a very wide range of problems. Surely you don't avoid using `make' and `rcs' in personal work because they also help in dealing with large problems! > (large projects with many poeple require a language oriented towards > tyranny rather than anarchy). Empty words. Type checking is not `tyranny', although I'm tempted to agree that C is anarchical.... > This does confirm that nobody will program in Ada for the joy of it, > but rather as a chore. What `confirms' this? > >the argument... on the net sounds more like defense of the > >familiar (C) against the unknown (Ada), which is not a very > >open-minded frame of mind for people in a high-tech, fast-paced > >industry. Steve Frysinger > ** what is more open-minded than programming because it is enjoyable > rather than a duty? What does this have to do with open-mindedness? Open-mindedness suggests a willingness to invest some (initially possibly unpleasant) effort to learn others' approaches. `Programming because it is enjoyable' is simply self-indulgence. (Though I hasten to add that I hardly feel that I'm doing drudgework when working in Ada; indeed, I feel it in C.) > I have also seen projects for which C presented portability and many > people could modify the code and understand it. Microsoft develops > all its applications in C, as do many other high- powered companies. > Some programs for bank use have been written in C and were amazingly > efficient (the programmers probably hated it :-) ). My code always > passes lint checks with the "-b" and other tight options. So what? ----------- I think it's clear from the above that no one has learned anything from this exchange. Can't we avoid this sort of offensive and pointless mudslinging? There are many serious issues in programming languages, including analyses of the strengths and weaknesses of different language design approaches. But PLEASE let your notes be <at least> civil and well-informed! -s