mfeldman@seas.gwu.edu (Michael Feldman) (05/21/91)
Ah, yes, Messrs. Holden and Showalter: it's deja vu all over again. Seems we go around this loop several times a year till everyone gets bored with it again. Could you guys PLEASE knock it off or take it to private e-mail? Ted, we've heard your opinions over and over, every few months. I'm not judging them, merely asking that you not be so repetitious. Jim: leave him alone, maybe he'll go away again... Mike
kmccook@wrdis01.af.mil (McCook) (05/21/91)
In article <3208@sparko.gwu.edu> mfeldman@seas.gwu.edu (Michael Feldman) writes: >Ah, yes, Messrs. Holden and Showalter: it's deja vu all over again. >Seems we go around this loop several times a year till everyone gets bored >with it again. Could you guys PLEASE knock it off or take it to private >e-mail? Ted, we've heard your opinions over and over, every few months. >I'm not judging them, merely asking that you not be so repetitious. >Jim: leave him alone, maybe he'll go away again... > >Mike AMEN!!
simon@blue.cs.washington.edu (Kevin Simonson) (05/21/91)
In article <3208@sparko.gwu.edu> mfeldman@seas.gwu.edu (Michael Feldman) writes: =Ah, yes, Messrs. Holden and Showalter: it's deja vu all over again. =Seems we go around this loop several times a year till everyone gets bored =with it again. ... =Jim: leave him alone, maybe he'll go away again... When I was a working person instead of a student, we had access to a newsgroup that regularly posted what it very accurately termed religious debates over whether Ada or C++ was better suited for the particular niche Ada was designed to fill. I remember thinking that if I listened to all the pros and cons, I would get some sort of a feel for the number of people who thought each language was superior (while arguing farely close to ra- tionally) and that I might use that as a guage of whether one language really WAS superior. Now that I'm a student, and am actually LEARNING C, it's a whole dif- ferent story, and I sometimes wonder how C++, that has C as its parent, could possibly be considered as an alternative to Ada. I think this initial reaction of mine is typical of how many people look at the Ada-C++ debate. After all, I was raised with Pascal and Modula 2, which are related to Ada much more than they are to C. As I code more and more in C I keep telling myself that there are very possibly advantages to the language that I will get to know in time. (This might not be true, but I keep telling it to myself anyway.) What about the question of the REAL superiority of one of the two lan- guages? Given the strong opinions (by apparently rational people) on both sides of the debate, I'd wager that the good points of both languages are probably close enough together that it really is worth nobody's while to go to the depth necessary to rigorously prove the answer to this question. Perhaps, as somebody suggested earlier, the best idea is to keep an open mind and see if one (or both) of the languages is fit enough to SUR- VIVE a significant amount of time. ---Kevin Simonson -- Murphy's Law of Aerodynamics: When the weight of the paperwork equals the weight of the airplane, the airplane flies.
rharwood@east.pima.edu (05/21/91)
Aw shucks, Mike... I was hoping the flames would continue just a little longer so that I'd have more incentive to learn the KILL option of NEWS! I HAVE heard verbal complaints from readers of the INFO-ADA list who don't have much choice but to labor through the whole muck. In reality, it is a shame to have 500 and 700 line messages floating all over the countryside which so blatantly SHOUT one's opinion. If I am successful at starting a CompuServe Ada Forum, such opinions will be welcomed, but few people will tolerate spending a single nickel reading articles of the tone so recently endured here, even at only $6 or $12 an hour. I can't and won't argue for/against C++ because I don't know the language. I CAN argue the merits of structured design and coding. The analogy I often tout is that coding in Ada grabs you by the arm and LEADS you down a structured path, but coding with C -- while you CAN mold it into bricks -- tends to fall helter-skelter in a heap of <something>. I've had students whose first language was Pascal remark, after taking C, "Gee, I don't know what all the fuss is about, with a little effort you can write structured code in C just as well as you can in any other language." On the other hand, "C-first" students generally remark: "I don't know why you go to all that extra effort to write structured code in the first place; my version works just as well as yours and it only took 100 lines. Oh, don't worry about maintenance, this is just a student exercise, and if it was the real world, someone else would have to worry about re-writing it... they'd probably just junk it and start all over anyway." How right they are! OK, so I don't have sworn affadavits for the above statements, but they DO reflect the attitudes of 5 consecutive semesters of data structures students... ----- Ray Harwood |Data Basix |Associate Faculty, Voice: (602)721-1988 |PO Box 18324 | Pima Community College FAX: (602)721-7240 |Tucson, AZ 85731 |Instructor in Ada and Pascal CompuServe: 76645,1370|AppleLink: DATA.BASIX|Internet: rharwood@east.pima.edu
mfeldman@seas.gwu.edu (Michael Feldman) (05/22/91)
Once again I'd like to plead for keeping this an Ada group. We are all entitled to our opinions; mine is that it's not a good place for language bashing or emotional comparisons between languages. This is at least the 7th time in the last few years that we've gotten into a war of words over Ada vs. the C family. I can hit the kill key, but the poor folks who get Info-Ada digests have to slog through the flames to read the other digested messages. Please let's end the emotional stuff, guys. Both Ada and C++ are here to stay; even-handed comparisons of features might be educational for us all, but this bashing is just a waste of network bandwidth. Ted, Jim, Ray: is this OK with you all? Mike PS - why don't you guys set up an alt group for language vs. language free-for-alls? I notice the Lisp proponents are into the act now...
jls@netcom.COM (Jim Showalter) (05/23/91)
>Once again I'd like to plead for keeping this an Ada group. We are all >entitled to our opinions; mine is that it's not a good place for >language bashing or emotional comparisons between languages. I could cop out and say that Ted started it, but I won't because I disagree with your premise. Yes, this is an Ada group, and so that is where I discuss issues related to Ada. All of them. Would you prefer that the group be limited to questions about Meridian compilers? Why? If the issue is length, I apologize for the 700 liner the other day--but 500 lines of it were originally from Ted... As for the emotion, I've been laboring under the impression that I've kept it to a mild simmer for the past couple of weeks. Is this not the case? I have received several e-mail messages from people who thought my responses to Ted were factual and not particularly emotional, which I thought was pretty promising feedback. > why don't you guys set up a group for language vs language >free-for-alls? I notice the Lisp proponents are into the act now... It already exists: alt.flame ;-) -- **************** JIM SHOWALTER, jls@netcom.com, (408) 243-0630 **************** *Proven solutions to software problems. Consulting and training on all aspects* *of software development. Management/process/methodology. Architecture/design/* *reuse. Quality/productivity. Risk reduction. EFFECTIVE OO usage. Ada/C++. *