KLENSIN@INFOODS.MIT.EDU (John C Klensin) (05/23/89)
Tom Williams writes: > Digital Research used to market PL/I for both CP/M and MS-DOS. I'm not sure >if they are still available. You'd still have to make a translation, PL/I and >PL/M aren't as much alike as you might think. Digital Research is still marketing what they describe as PL/I, or at least it keeps showing up in Ads and mailings from them. However... (1) They reduced the staff of their language group to zero or nearly zero some years ago, and announced that most of their language products (including the CP/M and MS-DOS versions of "PL/I") were "mature" and would basically no longer be maintained. As far as I know, this situation and policy is still in effect. These compilers are bug- and mis-feature laden, and you don't even get someone to sympathize when you encounter their special characteristics. (2) PL/M is very similar to PL/I in several respects, but not enough to make translation a worthwhile enterprise in most cases. (3) What Digital Research sells as PL/I is not, and has never been, PL/I as understood by anyone else. The strange restrictions... Now, those things that make it "not PL/I" might conceivably make it easier to get back and forth to PL/M: I don't know PL/M well enough to be competent to judge. Disclaimer: The opinions above are personal ones, and represent neither the official views of MIT nor those of the PL/I Standards Committee, which I chair.
jep@oink.UUCP (James E. Prior) (05/24/89)
In article <890522142425.00001ECA072@INFOODS.MIT.EDU> KLENSIN@INFOODS.MIT.EDU (John C Klensin) writes: ... regarding PL/M vs. PL/I ... > (2) PL/M is very similar to PL/I in several respects, but not enough >to make translation a worthwhile enterprise in most cases. I agree. Here are my own thoughts comparing them. PL/M (especially PL/M-51 that I've busted my arse on) is an itty bitty subset of PL/I. PL/I is a Cadillac of languages, with power seats with N degrees of freedom, remote control mirrors, cigarette lighters for everyone, automatice antenna, curb feelers, power steering, brakes, door locks, windows, sunroof, etc... It is a very rich language offering damn near all the features ever conceived. PL/M is a two cycle trail bike with no instrumentation, no gas filter, no air filter, and no muffler. It was to be quick and agile for microcontroller applications where time is a real concern (real time). It has the bare minimum of statements, expressions, and data types. It succeeds at being a step above assembler, but not much. PL/I and PL/M have the same _general_ structure and look, but that's about it. They both have their place. -- Jim Prior jep@oink osu-cis!n8emr!oink!jep N8KSM