jeffrey@algor2.algorists.com (Jeffrey Kegler) (11/20/89)
A number of postings has suggested that there is something unethical or immoral about advocating the particular interests of a specific vendor on the ANSI C committee, as opposed to the general public interest. Actually, if no one on X3J11 had put forward the views of the major vendors, X3J11 could not have performed its consensus building function. And if you are not going to build consensus, why bother having a committee? If no one had advocated the selfish narrow views of special interests, the work of X3J11 could not have been done. This is why many of the representatives were invited and why they were sent. And of course, the special interests are paying for the salary of their representives, and their expenses. If after that, their point of view went unspoken, wouldn't that be a real betrayal? In general, a lot of people have problems with the ethics of advocacy of selfish interests, as when a lawyer defends a despicable client. And entire countries have reorganized themselves so that there is nothing but the public interest (China, the Soviet Union, etc.) with the idea that this would create a better world. It may seem a paradox that one-sided advocacy of special interests (even those contrary to more general interests) promotes the general interest, but that is the way it works. My support of the right of special interests to representation, and defense of the ethicality of such representation, does not mean I have to like the point of view being advocated, especially when the advocacy is successful. I caught a fair number of flames by suggesting that special interests were behind a dpANS feature I don't like. One poster accused me of libeling the representatives when I suggested that they has actually represented the people they were requested and paid to represent. An E-mailer was even more pointed. The misunderstanding on this issue seems to be almost universal. Clearing it up will help us understand a lot more than how language standards are produced. -- Jeffrey Kegler, Independent UNIX Consultant, Algorists, Inc. jeffrey@algor2.ALGORISTS.COM or uunet!algor2!jeffrey 1762 Wainwright DR, Reston VA 22090
davidsen@crdos1.crd.ge.COM (Wm E Davidsen Jr) (11/21/89)
In article <1989Nov20.124013.28617@algor2.algorists.com> jeffrey@algor2.ALGORISTS.COM (Jeffrey Kegler) writes: | A number of postings has suggested that there is something unethical | or immoral about advocating the particular interests of a specific | vendor on the ANSI C committee, as opposed to the general public | interest. I don't think that any vendor was able to push *individual* special interests, at least to the detriment of the standard, because all the other vendors would object. I do think there was some bias toward eliminating features which would be hard to implement, and some were (almost) added because they would aid optimization. Obviously if the user wrote a standard they might generate another Ada, big and expensive to implement. They might not address areas which have to be defined for portability. Therefore I don't feel that a committee of all users would be productive. When I was on the committee (first two years) I was often the only person representing an organization which did not sell computers or a C compiler. I think the need for user representation was minimal. There were a few features dropped because they were hard to implement, so be it. Some things were slightly changed in definition to make implementation easier, and that's a good thing. I confess, I've written a few compilers, and I have a LOT of sympathy with the vendors. Honestly there are only a few places in which I feel that the committee dropped the ball, and my opinion is that these are places in which the wording is confusing, inexplicit, or obscure. I find only one feature in the standard which is well documented and which I think is inappropriate. I'm not going to discuss it in this thread, it has been beaten to death before without changing the mind of the committee. it is clearly a case of doing something for ease of implementation which is not existing practice, breaks existing programs and adds no useful functionality to the language. I don't like it, but I wouldn't want the standard to fail because the vendors took the easy way out on one issue. I think criticism of the committee because of vendor interest is very hard to justify by any facts, and that anyone who didn't care enough to participate either by being there or sending in comments should not complain about the process at this point. -- bill davidsen (davidsen@crdos1.crd.GE.COM -or- uunet!crdgw1!crdos1!davidsen) "The world is filled with fools. They blindly follow their so-called 'reason' in the face of the church and common sense. Any fool can see that the world is flat!" - anon
khb%chiba@Sun.COM (Keith Bierman - SPD Advanced Languages) (11/21/89)
In article <1989Nov20.124013.28617@algor2.algorists.com> jeffrey@algor2.ALGORISTS.COM (Jeffrey Kegler) writes: .... > >Actually, if no one on X3J11 had put forward the views of the major >vendors, X3J11 could not have performed its consensus building >function. And if you are not going to build consensus, why bother >having a committee? If no one had advocated the selfish narrow views >of special interests, the work of X3J11 could not have been done. >This is why many of the representatives were invited and why they were >sent. > >And of course, the special interests are paying for the salary of >their representives, and their expenses. If after that, their point >of view went unspoken, wouldn't that be a real betrayal? .... I'm part of X3J3, which operates under somewhat different rules than J11. In J3 there is a clear legal distinction between being an individual or being the formal rep of a company. the latter costs more, but allows greater lattitude in who may attend to represent the company. I am sure that several of the vendors on J11 are also huge users of C (all unixish vendors, for example), so there is not necessarily clearly diverging interests. Keith H. Bierman |*My thoughts are my own. !! kbierman@sun.com It's Not My Fault | MTS --Only my work belongs to Sun* I Voted for Bill & | Advanced Languages/Floating Point Group Opus | "When the going gets Weird .. the Weird turn PRO" "There is NO defense against the attack of the KILLER MICROS!" Eugene Brooks
" Maynard) (11/21/89)
I'm sure this was answered here before, but it's slipped my mind:
How are committee members chosen?
No, I'm not interested myself; I doubt the committee needs a naive-user
perspective...:-)
--
Jay Maynard, EMT-P, K5ZC, PP-ASEL | Never ascribe to malice that which can
jay@splut.conmicro.com (eieio)| adequately be explained by stupidity.
{attctc,bellcore}!texbell!splut!jay +----------------------------------------
Shall we try for comp.protocols.tcp-ip.eniac next, Richard? - Brandon Allberygwyn@smoke.BRL.MIL (Doug Gwyn) (11/22/89)
In article <1662@crdos1.crd.ge.COM> davidsen@crdos1.UUCP (bill davidsen) writes:
-I do think there was some bias toward
-eliminating features which would be hard to implement, and some were
-(almost) added because they would aid optimization.
But note, many users (as well as vendors) want improved "optimization".
There are also often user benefits to other issues one might think
"vendor-inspired".bright@Data-IO.COM (Walter Bright) (11/23/89)
In article <1989Nov20.124013.28617@algor2.algorists.com> jeffrey@algor2.ALGORISTS.COM (Jeffrey Kegler) writes: | A number of postings has suggested that there is something unethical | or immoral about advocating the particular interests of a specific | vendor on the ANSI C committee, as opposed to the general public | interest. I've also seen a lot of opinion that pushes the idea that compiler implementation issues are irrelevent, the only thing that counts is programmer issues. To present a counter argument: If implementing a language is excessively complex: 1. Fewer vendors will get into the business. 2. There will be long delays before compilers get implemented. 3. Fewer implementations directly translates into lower quality implementations, because of less competition. 4. Fewer implementations mean higher compiler prices. 5. Compile times will be slow. The programmer's interests are not well served by that scenario. I, for one, would prefer a high-quality implementation of a simple language than a poor-quality version of a complex one. For an example of the above 5 points, see Ada. P.S. I'm a compiler vendor (Zortech).
henry@utzoo.uucp (Henry Spencer) (11/23/89)
In article <1989Nov21.150638.26925@splut.conmicro.com> jay@splut.conmicro.com (Jay "you ignorant splut!" Maynard) writes: >I'm sure this was answered here before, but it's slipped my mind: >How are committee members chosen? Basically, anyone who has the time to read the interminable flow of paper and the resources to attend meetings from time to time can be a member of ANSI standards committees. As I recall there is a modest fee, but it's less than the cost of buying copies of a couple of the drafts from Global. The ANSI standardization process is specifically required to be open to all interested parties; that's how standards organizations avoid trouble with the anti-trust people. Don't underestimate how mind-numbing it can be to read the same dumb ideas for the tenth time (people who've never been involved in standards efforts have no idea of just how many cranks come out of the woodwork with 50-page proposals), or pore over the twenty-seventh draft of something you were sick of by the fifth draft. -- A bit of tolerance is worth a | Henry Spencer at U of Toronto Zoology megabyte of flaming. | uunet!attcan!utzoo!henry henry@zoo.toronto.edu