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ADA SUCKS, C/C++/JAVA RULES!!!!

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John Black

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Oct 28, 1997, 3:00:00 AM10/28/97
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I have tried and tried to program with Ada, but it is downright
impossible. I just don't see how anyone could - or would want to -
use this outdated piece of crap. It's back to C++ and Java for me.
Hopefully Ada and other languages will go the way of the dinosaur and
get hit by a meteor, disappearing from the face of the earth.

Marco Schramp

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Oct 28, 1997, 3:00:00 AM10/28/97
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John Black <nospam@nospam> wrote in article
<34557f2b...@news.mindspring.com>...
I'm glad that you know which languages you like and which you
don't. There is however no reason for putting it down like
this.

In all the groups that you posted to have been discussions about
which language is better and which isn't. The end-conclusion
has always been: personal taste, programs and programmers objectives
and other (somewhat subjective) opinions.
Let's not start a holy war against yet another language (in this
case ADA).

Marco.
---------------------
Swearing is the only language spoken proficiently by programmers.


Shayne Flint

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Oct 28, 1997, 3:00:00 AM10/28/97
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John Black wrote:
>
> I have tried and tried to program with Ada, but it is downright
> impossible. I just don't see how anyone could - or would want to -
> use this outdated piece of crap.

I wouldn't usually react like this, but:

If you had so much trouble with Ada you must be completely STUPID and
USELESS!!

Let this be the end of this thread.

------------------------------------------------------------------
-- Shayne Flint, MIEAust, CPEng sha...@ainslie-software.com
-- Ainslie Software Pty Limited http://www.ainslie-software.com
--
-- ShapeDB, a database and form drawing add-on for Visio
------------------------------------------------------------------

Adam Beneschan

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Oct 28, 1997, 3:00:00 AM10/28/97
to

nospam@nospam (John Black) writes:

>I have tried and tried to program with Ada, but it is downright
>impossible. I just don't see how anyone could - or would want to -
>use this outdated piece of crap. It's back to C++ and Java for me.
>Hopefully Ada and other languages will go the way of the dinosaur and
>get hit by a meteor, disappearing from the face of the earth.

I once heard of a computer language named TROLL; I have no idea what
it's like, but I think you should look into it. I'll bet it's
something you'd really enjoy programming in.

-- Adam

(sorry, couldn't resist)

Tucker Taft

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Oct 28, 1997, 3:00:00 AM10/28/97
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BRIAN LANGENBERGER (lang...@itlabs.umn.edu) wrote:

: While I've never done any significant programming in Ada (anyone know
: of a good GNUada compiler? ;)

FWIW, there is a good GNUAda compiler, known as "GNAT"
(cf. www.gnat.com), which has, among others, real-live
"GNU" folks as part of their development staff.

It has the usual download price of $0.00, with commercial support
contracts available from a company called "ACT" (analogous
to Cygnus for GCC).

There are also other freely-downloadable "personal" versions of
Ada95 compilers as well; cf www.aonix.com and www.appletmagic.com.

--
-Tucker Taft s...@inmet.com http://www.inmet.com/~stt/
Intermetrics, Inc. Burlington, MA USA

Kenneth W. Sodemann

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Oct 28, 1997, 3:00:00 AM10/28/97
to

John Black, in message <34557f2b...@news.mindspring.com> spewed
forth...

>I have tried and tried to program with Ada, but it is downright
>impossible. I just don't see how anyone could - or would want to -
>use this outdated piece of crap. It's back to C++ and Java for me.
>Hopefully Ada and other languages will go the way of the dinosaur and
>get hit by a meteor, disappearing from the face of the earth.

1.) Nice troll!!

2.) I find it interesting that YOU fail, and then blame the language for
YOUR inability to grasp it.

3.) It is admirable that you are able to come out and let everyone know
that you are incapable of adapting to a new language, even though I cannot
think of anything you can do in the other languages mentioned that you
cannot do in some way using Ada. Maybe you are just lost without your
wizards?

4.) Many of the Ada projects that I have worked on would have been much
more difficult, or down right impossible, to manage in C or C++ (I have not
done large scale development (or even testing) of anything written in Java,
so I cannot comment on that). Add to that the fact that for certain types
of projects, you also get a lower cost of development and (especially)
maintenance, a tendency for less bugs, etc.

Of course, if you are mostly writing Windows apps, then VC++ is a lot better
environment than _anything_ you are going to get for Ada (at least at this
time). Then again, we are coming back to "use the right tool for the right
job", and right now, VC++ or VB (or maybe even Java) is often the right tool
for that job (though Ada is making some in roads there, but the tools are
not quite on par with VC++ yet (IMHO)).

--
with Std_Disclaimer; use Std_Disclaimer;
Signature.Put (Name => Ken Sodemann,
E_Mail => kwso...@avistainc.com
Web => http://www.pcii.net/~stuffel
Company_Web => http://www.avistainc.com);


Kenneth W. Sodemann

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Oct 28, 1997, 3:00:00 AM10/28/97
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Kenneth W. Sodemann

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Oct 28, 1997, 3:00:00 AM10/28/97
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Steve Ropa

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Oct 28, 1997, 3:00:00 AM10/28/97
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On Tue, 28 Oct 1997, Kenneth W. Sodemann wrote:

<snip very good points>


>
> 4.) Many of the Ada projects that I have worked on would have been much
> more difficult, or down right impossible, to manage in C or C++ (I have not
> done large scale development (or even testing) of anything written in Java,
> so I cannot comment on that). Add to that the fact that for certain types
> of projects, you also get a lower cost of development and (especially)
> maintenance, a tendency for less bugs, etc.
>
> Of course, if you are mostly writing Windows apps, then VC++ is a lot better
> environment than _anything_ you are going to get for Ada (at least at this
> time). Then again, we are coming back to "use the right tool for the right
> job", and right now, VC++ or VB (or maybe even Java) is often the right tool
> for that job (though Ada is making some in roads there, but the tools are
> not quite on par with VC++ yet (IMHO)).
>

I hate to keep a thread going that started with such an inane comment(see
subject) but *your* points were very well articulated, and lead me to a
question.
As you said, it all boils down to the right tool for the right job. What
types of jobs are Ada best suited for? I got into development through self
learning, so I never really had the benefit of experiencing a lot of
different languages.

Thanks
Steve


Kenneth W. Sodemann

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Oct 28, 1997, 3:00:00 AM10/28/97
to

John Black, in message <34557f2b...@news.mindspring.com> spewed
forth...
>I have tried and tried to program with Ada, but it is downright
>impossible. I just don't see how anyone could - or would want to -
>use this outdated piece of crap. It's back to C++ and Java for me.
>Hopefully Ada and other languages will go the way of the dinosaur and
>get hit by a meteor, disappearing from the face of the earth.

1.) Nice troll!!

2.) I find it interesting that YOU fail, and then blame the language for
YOUR inability to grasp it.

3.) It is admirable that you are able to come out and let everyone know
that you are incapable of adapting to a new language, even though I cannot
think of anything you can do in the other languages mentioned that you
cannot do in some way using Ada. Maybe you are just lost without your
wizards?

4.) Many of the Ada projects that I have worked on would have been much


more difficult, or down right impossible, to manage in C or C++ (I have not
done large scale development (or even testing) of anything written in Java,
so I cannot comment on that). Add to that the fact that for certain types
of projects, you also get a lower cost of development and (especially)
maintenance, a tendency for less bugs, etc.

Of course, if you are mostly writing Windows apps, then VC++ is a lot better
environment than _anything_ you are going to get for Ada (at least at this
time). Then again, we are coming back to "use the right tool for the right
job", and right now, VC++ or VB (or maybe even Java) is often the right tool
for that job (though Ada is making some in roads there, but the tools are
not quite on par with VC++ yet (IMHO)).

--

Kenneth W. Sodemann

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Oct 28, 1997, 3:00:00 AM10/28/97
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Kenneth W. Sodemann

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Oct 28, 1997, 3:00:00 AM10/28/97
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Dann Corbit

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Oct 28, 1997, 3:00:00 AM10/28/97
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John Black wrote in message <34566fe...@news.mindspring.com>...
>You guys say what you want but it's true. ADA is good for nothing.
>C++, on the other hand, is the only language you need.
Boy, this is just great. The "C or C++" thread was not good enough. Now that
it has passed the previous world record for spam harvesting, we pull Ada and
Java into the mix. Pretty please, down on my knees, I'm begging you to trim
comp.lang.c from the header when replying to this post.

I like Ada. I like Java. I like C. I like C++. I hate these inane threads.
Gargantuan avalanches of pseudo-information, opinions stated as facts, and
name calling.

Oh, goody.
--
C-FAQ ftp sites: ftp://ftp.eskimo.com ftp://rtfm.mit.edu
Hypertext C-FAQ: http://www.eskimo.com/~scs/C-faq/top.html
C-FAQ Book: ISBN 0-201-84519-9.
Want Software? Algorithms? Pubs? http://www.infoseek.com

John Black

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Oct 28, 1997, 3:00:00 AM10/28/97
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John Black

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Oct 28, 1997, 3:00:00 AM10/28/97
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ADA and Pascal are two of the most useless inventions Man has ever
wasted space on this planet with. These languages are hard to learn,
have zero applications, and people who only know these languages can
only find jobs at Taco Bell! Smart programmers spend their time
learning only C, C++, and Java in that order.

Robert S. White

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Oct 28, 1997, 3:00:00 AM10/28/97
to

In article <Pine.SUN.3.96.971028...@flatland.dimensional.com>,
ther...@dimensional.com says...

>As you said, it all boils down to the right tool for the right job. What
>types of jobs are Ada best suited for? I got into development through self
>learning, so I never really had the benefit of experiencing a lot of
>different languages.

IME Ada has worked out very well for difficult embedded systems
maintained by a team of software engineers for a significant period
of time. Stuff like avionics, spaceborne electronics, munitions and
other things you don't want to fail. I've heard that some banks also
found that reliable and easy to maintain software systems are a plus.
Check out: http://www.adahome.com for more answers to this question.

And again IME it is _not_ hard to teach a new college grad engineer
(who has never used Ada) how to effectively use Ada in a very short
time. With development environments ranging from Rational Apex to
very nice (but simple) AdaGIDE/GNAT, it is very simple to develope
Ada code.

Ada's current weak points, IMHO / IME, are in "wizard smart" GUI
code generation.
_____________________________________________________________________
Robert S. White -- An embedded systems software engineer
e-mail reply to reverse of: ia us lib cedar-rapids crpl shift2 whiter


Charles R. Lyttle

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Oct 28, 1997, 3:00:00 AM10/28/97
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--------------108E80454C4234ACA219AC32
Content-Type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii
Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit

Steve Ropa wrote:

> On Tue, 28 Oct 1997, Kenneth W. Sodemann wrote:
>
> <snip very good points>
> >

> > 4.) Many of the Ada projects that I have worked on would have been much
> > more difficult, or down right impossible, to manage in C or C++ (I have not
> > done large scale development (or even testing) of anything written in Java,
> > so I cannot comment on that). Add to that the fact that for certain types
> > of projects, you also get a lower cost of development and (especially)
> > maintenance, a tendency for less bugs, etc.
> >
> > Of course, if you are mostly writing Windows apps, then VC++ is a lot better
> > environment than _anything_ you are going to get for Ada (at least at this
> > time). Then again, we are coming back to "use the right tool for the right
> > job", and right now, VC++ or VB (or maybe even Java) is often the right tool
> > for that job (though Ada is making some in roads there, but the tools are
> > not quite on par with VC++ yet (IMHO)).
> >
>

> I hate to keep a thread going that started with such an inane comment(see
> subject) but *your* points were very well articulated, and lead me to a
> question.

> As you said, it all boils down to the right tool for the right job. What
> types of jobs are Ada best suited for? I got into development through self
> learning, so I never really had the benefit of experiencing a lot of
> different languages.
>

> Thanks
> Steve

I find Ada best for really big jobs (1_000_000 or more lines) with lots of formal
methodologies and a need for high reliability. I hope Java will fill the under
1_000_000 spot one day soon.

--

Russ Lyttle

email : lyt...@mail.flash.net

--------------108E80454C4234ACA219AC32
Content-Type: text/html; charset=us-ascii
Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit

<HTML>
Steve Ropa wrote:
<BLOCKQUOTE TYPE=CITE>On Tue, 28 Oct 1997, Kenneth W. Sodemann wrote:

<P>&lt;snip very good points>
<BR>>
<BR>> 4.)&nbsp; Many of the Ada projects that I have worked on would have
been much
<BR>> more difficult, or down right impossible, to manage in C or C++ (I
have not
<BR>> done large scale development (or even testing) of anything written
in Java,
<BR>> so I cannot comment on that).&nbsp; Add to that the fact that for
certain types
<BR>> of projects, you also get a lower cost of development and (especially)
<BR>> maintenance, a tendency for less bugs, etc.
<BR>>
<BR>> Of course, if you are mostly writing Windows apps, then VC++ is a
lot better
<BR>> environment than _anything_ you are going to get for Ada (at least
at this
<BR>> time).&nbsp; Then again, we are coming back to "use the right tool
for the right
<BR>> job", and right now, VC++ or VB (or maybe even Java) is often the
right tool
<BR>> for that job (though Ada is making some in roads there, but the tools
are
<BR>> not quite on par with VC++ yet (IMHO)).
<BR>>

<P>I hate to keep a thread going that started with such an inane comment(see
<BR>subject) but *your* points were very well articulated, and lead me
to a
<BR>question.
<BR>As you said, it all boils down to the right tool for the right job.&nbsp;
What
<BR>types of jobs are Ada best suited for? I got into development through
self
<BR>learning, so I never really had the benefit of experiencing a lot of
<BR>different languages.

<P>Thanks
<BR>Steve</BLOCKQUOTE>
I find Ada best for really big jobs (1_000_000 or more lines) with lots
of formal methodologies and a need for high reliability. I hope Java will
fill the under 1_000_000 spot one day soon.&nbsp;
<PRE>--&nbsp;

Russ Lyttle&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;
<http://www.flash.net/~lyttlec>&nbsp;
email : lyt...@mail.flash.net</PRE>
&nbsp;</HTML>

--------------108E80454C4234ACA219AC32--


Rob Eamon

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Oct 28, 1997, 3:00:00 AM10/28/97
to

John Black wrote in message <34557f2b...@news.mindspring.com>...

>I have tried and tried to program with Ada, but it is downright
>impossible. I just don't see how anyone could - or would want to -
>use this outdated piece of crap. It's back to C++ and Java for me.
>Hopefully Ada and other languages will go the way of the dinosaur and
>get hit by a meteor, disappearing from the face of the earth.

This seems to be a fairly typical reaction by C/C++ programmers.
(And I don't mean this in a negative way.) The Ada syntax is
more verbose and tends to make those who are comfortable
with a terse language a little crazy. Also the strong type checking
will make a C/C++ programmer who is used to playing loose
and easy with pointers and casting pull their hair out.

Ada has some good features, including having multitasking
support built into the language. Ada is useful in many contexts,
but unless you had a specific reason for using Ada, it's not
surprising that you abandoned it for what you already know.


BRIAN LANGENBERGER

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Oct 28, 1997, 3:00:00 AM10/28/97
to

John Black (nospam@nospam) wrote:
: I have tried and tried to program with Ada, but it is downright

: impossible. I just don't see how anyone could - or would want to -
: use this outdated piece of crap. It's back to C++ and Java for me.
: Hopefully Ada and other languages will go the way of the dinosaur and
: get hit by a meteor, disappearing from the face of the earth.

While I've never done any significant programming in Ada (anyone know
of a good GNUada compiler? ;) I wouldn't want it going away.
More programming languages mean more variety, and with the vast multitudes
of hardware availible (and, consequently, problems to be solved),
programmers need all the tools (i.e. languages) we can get.

I'd like to see more languages rather than less.

Kenneth W. Sodemann

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Oct 28, 1997, 3:00:00 AM10/28/97
to

John Black, in message <34557f2b...@news.mindspring.com> spewed
forth...
>I have tried and tried to program with Ada, but it is downright
>impossible. I just don't see how anyone could - or would want to -
>use this outdated piece of crap. It's back to C++ and Java for me.
>Hopefully Ada and other languages will go the way of the dinosaur and
>get hit by a meteor, disappearing from the face of the earth.

1.) Nice troll!!

2.) I find it interesting that YOU fail, and then blame the language for
YOUR inability to grasp it.

3.) It is admirable that you are able to come out and let everyone know
that you are incapable of adapting to a new language, even though I cannot
think of anything you can do in the other languages mentioned that you
cannot do in some way using Ada. Maybe you are just lost without your
wizards?

4.) Many of the Ada projects that I have worked on would have been much


more difficult, or down right impossible, to manage in C or C++ (I have not
done large scale development (or even testing) of anything written in Java,
so I cannot comment on that). Add to that the fact that for certain types
of projects, you also get a lower cost of development and (especially)
maintenance, a tendency for less bugs, etc.

Of course, if you are mostly writing Windows apps, then VC++ is a lot better
environment than _anything_ you are going to get for Ada (at least at this
time). Then again, we are coming back to "use the right tool for the right
job", and right now, VC++ or VB (or maybe even Java) is often the right tool
for that job (though Ada is making some in roads there, but the tools are
not quite on par with VC++ yet (IMHO)).

--

Kenneth W. Sodemann

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Oct 28, 1997, 3:00:00 AM10/28/97
to

Kenneth W. Sodemann

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Oct 28, 1997, 3:00:00 AM10/28/97
to

Rob

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Oct 28, 1997, 3:00:00 AM10/28/97
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BRIAN LANGENBERGER wrote:
>>While I've never done any significant programming in Ada (anyone know
of a good GNUada compiler? ;) <<

as a matter of fact: gnat

David A. Frantz

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Oct 28, 1997, 3:00:00 AM10/28/97
to

ADA and Pascal hard to learn he he. Just how many programmers out there
have a handle on C++. The whole package; STL, IOstreams, Class,
Templates - I could go on and on but the point is that there are only a
handful of people out there with a complete understanding of C++. Then
there is the Question of how many of those are actually productive with it.
If C++ is that simple then we should be able to find VALIDATED compilers on
the market, far as I Know there is none out there.

The problem with ADA is that it is rejected by the hacker cult that started
out on C. Mean while C & C++ have been rejected by anybody who has to
ship a product under tight deadlines and high quality expectations. i.e.
anyone working for a corporation.

Dave

John Black wrote in message <345673af...@news.mindspring.com>...

John Bode

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Oct 28, 1997, 3:00:00 AM10/28/97
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In article <34566fe...@news.mindspring.com>, nospam@nospam (John
Black) wrote:

> You guys say what you want but it's true. ADA is good for nothing.
> C++, on the other hand, is the only language you need.

C++?!?! The COBOL of the Nineties (with apologies to COBOL)? The most
God-awful kludge of a language in the history of Western civilization? The
most complicated, un-object-oriented OOL? A language with no standard,
conflicting goals, and inconsistent implementations? A language where Herb
Schildt is just as likely to be right about a particular feature as anyone?

Question: How object-oriented is a language that still relies on #include
files?

--
John Bode
one grumpy code monkey

"Paranoia is just reality on a finer scale" -- Strange Days

To email me directly, remove the 'nospam.' from my address.

John Bode

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Oct 28, 1997, 3:00:00 AM10/28/97
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In article <34557f2b...@news.mindspring.com>, nospam@nospam (John
Black) wrote:

> I have tried and tried to program with Ada, but it is downright
> impossible. I just don't see how anyone could - or would want to -
> use this outdated piece of crap. It's back to C++ and Java for me.
> Hopefully Ada and other languages will go the way of the dinosaur and
> get hit by a meteor, disappearing from the face of the earth.

My, what a *cute* little troll. Just makes you want to grab a 2x4 and beat
the crap out of it, doesn't it?

Dennis Weldy

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Oct 28, 1997, 3:00:00 AM10/28/97
to

I wouldnt say he'c completely stupid. Really, we oughta thank him for
publicizing his approach to problem solving, particularly when he has
difficulties. This way, if y'see a resume cross your desk with the name
"John Black", you'll know where to file it ;-)

Dennis
Shayne Flint wrote in message <3455D9...@ainslie-software.com>...


>John Black wrote:
>>
>> I have tried and tried to program with Ada, but it is downright
>> impossible. I just don't see how anyone could - or would want to -
>> use this outdated piece of crap.
>

BRIAN LANGENBERGER

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Oct 29, 1997, 3:00:00 AM10/29/97
to

John Black (nospam@nospam) wrote:
: You guys say what you want but it's true. ADA is good for nothing.
: C++, on the other hand, is the only language you need.

If you wanted a progam to clean our your netscape cache every time
you logged-out, would you really write it in C++? A shell script
seems like a better alternative to me. What about a simple text
filter that turns newlines to spaces? Regular C seems just fine
for that task.

IMO, a real programmer wouldn't ignore potentially
useful programming languages any more than a real carpenter would
try building a house with only a screwdriver.

As long as the job gets done properly, who really cares what
language(s) was/were used?

Timo Salmi

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Oct 29, 1997, 3:00:00 AM10/29/97
to

In article <345673af...@news.mindspring.com>,
John Black <nospam@nospam> wrote:
:ADA and Pascal are two of the most useless inventions Man has ever

:wasted space on this planet with. These languages are hard to learn,

*** TROLL ALERT *** TROLL ALERT *** TROLL ALERT *** TROLL ALERT ***

*** IGNORE THE BAIT *** IGNORE THE BAIT *** IGNORE THE BAIT ***

All the best, Timo

....................................................................
Prof. Timo Salmi Co-moderator of news:comp.archives.msdos.announce
Moderating at ftp:// & http://garbo.uwasa.fi/ archives 193.166.120.5
Department of Accounting and Business Finance ; University of Vaasa
mailto:t...@uwasa.fi <http://www.uwasa.fi/~ts/> ; FIN-65101, Finland

Spam foiling in effect. My email filter autoresponder will return a
required email password to users not yet in the privileges database.

Shombe Kroll

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Oct 29, 1997, 3:00:00 AM10/29/97
to

Hello everyone, I hate to say it but my sentiments are with Mr. Black to a
small degree. My first programming class in college was in ADA and I found
it very difficult to learn because of the lack of documentation and help
aids for the language. That forced me to rely on my Professor for help
which unfortunately was like pulling teeth. The lack of being able to
obtain outside sources from my local computer store ie : "ADA for Dummies"
left me with a feeling of complete frustration while I spent the semester
copying and reediting code from my fellow struggling classmates in order to
pass the course.
However, struggling with ADA did give me an appreciation for the process of
writing source code, and I have found that the fundamentals that I learned
with ADA are applicable to me as I learn C++. <-- By the way this time I am
writing my own code),

>John Black wrote in message <345673af...@news.mindspring.com>...

John Black

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Oct 29, 1997, 3:00:00 AM10/29/97
to

Shombe, I feel your pain. I'm embroiled in a Comparative Programming
Language class where we have to program in Ada, and the thing is so
impossible, I'm lucky to even get it to compile, never mind Constraint
Errors. And why bother sweating over a language that nobody uses!?
At least I know C++, and I can pick up Java relatively easily.
Knowing Ada and Pascal are almost as useful as knowing outer space
basket weaving.

John Black

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Oct 29, 1997, 3:00:00 AM10/29/97
to

Then why do the want ads for C, C++ programmers could stretch from
here to the moon, while Ada/Pascal programmers are nonexistent? Like
I said, if you program in Ada or Pascal, your best job is going to be
taking orders at Red Lobster.

Alan E & Carmel J Brain

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Oct 29, 1997, 3:00:00 AM10/29/97
to

Shayne Flint wrote:
>
> John Black wrote:
> >
> > I have tried and tried to program with Ada, but it is downright
> > impossible. I just don't see how anyone could - or would want to -
> > use this outdated piece of crap.
>
> I wouldn't usually react like this, but:
>
> If you had so much trouble with Ada you must be completely STUPID and
> USELESS!!
>
> Let this be the end of this thread.

At the risk of contradicting you, Shayne, consider:

either this is a guy who finds

#include stdio.h
void main()
{
printf("Hello World/n/n/n");
|

easy, neat, and generally "better" while

with TEXT_IO;
procedure MAIN is
begin
TEXT_IO.PUT("Hello World")
NEW_LINE(3);
end;

is impossibly hard, obsolete and "worse", XOR it's a troll. Given the
pre-pubescent "X sucks Y rules" header, you're right in either case.
--
aeb...@dynamite.com.au <> <> How doth the little Crocodile
| Alan & Carmel Brain| xxxxx Improve his shining tail?
| Canberra Australia | xxxxxHxHxxxxxx _MMMMMMMMM_MMMMMMMMM
abr...@cs.adfa.oz.au o OO*O^^^^O*OO o oo oo oo oo
By pulling MAERKLIN Wagons, in 1/220 Scale


Dale Stanbrough

unread,
Oct 29, 1997, 3:00:00 AM10/29/97
to

Mr John (I'm not going to reveal my secret identity) Black writes:

"Shombe, I feel your pain. I'm embroiled in a Comparative Programming
Language class where we have to program in Ada, and the thing is so
impossible, I'm lucky to even get it to compile, never mind Constraint
Errors."

Translation:

I'm so hopeless i can't even understand a few rules on how to program
a language.

"And why bother sweating over a language that nobody uses!?
At least I know C++, and I can pick up Java relatively easily.
Knowing Ada and Pascal are almost as useful as knowing outer space
basket weaving."

Translation:

I'm so incapable of realising that another language may have other
points of view to present, that I'll claim it's useless.


Unbelievable!


Dale

Xu Yifeng

unread,
Oct 29, 1997, 3:00:00 AM10/29/97
to

John Black wrote:
>
> ADA and Pascal are two of the most useless inventions Man has ever
> wasted space on this planet with. These languages are hard to learn,
> have zero applications, and people who only know these languages can
> only find jobs at Taco Bell! Smart programmers spend their time
> learning only C, C++, and Java in that order.

Let Pascal and ADA exist in the world, otherwise, we won't feel C/C++
is better language.

Regards,
Xu Yifeng

Philip Brashear

unread,
Oct 29, 1997, 3:00:00 AM10/29/97
to

In article <34566fe...@news.mindspring.com>,

John Black <nospam@nospam> wrote:
>You guys say what you want but it's true. ADA is good for nothing.
>C++, on the other hand, is the only language you need.


Remember the old Persian proverb:

He who knows and knows that he knows is wise -- follow him
He who knows and knows not that he knows is asleep -- waken him
He who knows not and knows that he knows not is a child -- teach him
He whos knows not and knows not that he knows not is a fool -- shun him

Which category does John fall into?

Phil Brashear
(14 years of Ada experience, including teaching it to college freshmen)


Steve Ropa

unread,
Oct 29, 1997, 3:00:00 AM10/29/97
to

On 28 Oct 1997, Robert S. White wrote:

>
> IME Ada has worked out very well for difficult embedded systems
> maintained by a team of software engineers for a significant period
> of time. Stuff like avionics, spaceborne electronics, munitions and
> other things you don't want to fail. I've heard that some banks also
> found that reliable and easy to maintain software systems are a plus.
> Check out: http://www.adahome.com for more answers to this question.
>
> And again IME it is _not_ hard to teach a new college grad engineer
> (who has never used Ada) how to effectively use Ada in a very short
> time. With development environments ranging from Rational Apex to
> very nice (but simple) AdaGIDE/GNAT, it is very simple to develope
> Ada code.
>
> Ada's current weak points, IMHO / IME, are in "wizard smart" GUI
> code generation.

Personally, I would like to see less emphasis on wizards anyway. I have
had too many developers tell me they knew what they were doing, but when I
took their wizards away, they were lost!

Steve


Mike Copeland

unread,
Oct 29, 1997, 3:00:00 AM10/29/97
to

> Hello everyone, I hate to say it but my sentiments are with Mr. Black to a
> small degree. My first programming class in college was in ADA and I found
> it very difficult to learn because of the lack of documentation and help
> aids for the language.

Well, it seems you missed a fundamental fact: it's "Ada", not "ADA".
This language, like Pascal (not "PASCAL"), is named for someone (it's a
proper name, not an acronym). I daresay if you had learned this and a
few other points, you might not be so antagonistic about some of these
things...

> That forced me to rely on my Professor for help
> which unfortunately was like pulling teeth. The lack of being able to
> obtain outside sources from my local computer store ie : "ADA for Dummies"
> left me with a feeling of complete frustration while I spent the semester
> copying and reediting code from my fellow struggling classmates in order to
> pass the course.

You poor thing - you actually had to _learn_ something on its own
merits, by your own work and instructor interaction, and there wasn't a
"Cliff's Notes" to work from. It's truly a shame how the education
system has fallen in these last 10-20 years...

> However, struggling with ADA did give me an appreciation for the process of
> writing source code, and I have found that the fundamentals that I learned
> with ADA are applicable to me as I learn C++. <-- By the way this time I am
> writing my own code),

Did you think that computer programs somehow "wrote themselves" and
that you _wouldn't_ have to do such things? Did you sleep through your
high school computer classes, as well? What did you _expect_???

> >>ADA and Pascal are two of the most useless inventions Man has ever
> >>wasted space on this planet with. These languages are hard to learn,

Him, too - what _did_ he expect?...

Mike Copeland

unread,
Oct 29, 1997, 3:00:00 AM10/29/97
to

This has almost nothing to do with the "ease of learning" either
language (and I feel C/C++ is much harder to do so than Pascal), but by
some other factors:
1. The portability issue. C/C++ are basically portable across
platforms, and this is an extremely important issue to corporate
thinking. It's more important to the executives/decision makers of most
companies that their key applications can be moved to other vendor's
hardware when financial issues force such switches, than to have
implementation languages which their programmers like and find easy to
learn.
2. Pascal and Ada (which is often called a highly enriched Pascal)
weren't designed as application development vehicles - whereas C/C++
were. Pascal was invented as a teaching tool for structured and module
problem solving, to show and overcome the faults of weakly typed and
inherently undisciplined coding languages of the past (e.g. COBOL,
ForTran, BASIC, assembler, etc.). There was almost no thought given to
I/o, databases, strings, and performance issues with Wirth's Pascal, and
he designed the language to teach the initial concepts of program
correctness, and modular design. It wasn't until Borland marketed Turbo
Pascal (which they didn't initially write) that Pascal became a real
implementation tool, instead of the "teaching toy" it really was.
However, Pascal is almost non-existent in the business environment,
regardless of how many hobbiests and PC programmers make effective use of
it....sigh
Ada, OTOH, was designed for implementation of secure and fail-safe
systems for the Government. It was based on Pascal concepts (very strong
typing, modularity, consistency, etc.), but was taken much farther than
was useful to the general world. Learning Ada should be considered an
educational experience, at best, because no one uses it. And I agree
it's very hard to learn and work with, even coming from a Pascal
background. Nonetheless, Ada provides some interesting and useful things
for any serious programmer to think about and use in his/her work.

Kaz Kylheku

unread,
Oct 29, 1997, 3:00:00 AM10/29/97
to

In article <MPG.ec125666...@news.primenet.com>,

Mike Copeland <mrc...@primenet.com> wrote:
>was useful to the general world. Learning Ada should be considered an
>educational experience, at best, because no one uses it. And I agree

That is nonse. Perhaps by ``noone'' you mean ``nobody in Windows land'',
and even after that correctio it is false.

Next door to me, a prominent company is developing an air traffic control
system using Ada in a joint venture with other companies.
--
"In My Egotistical Opinion, most people's C programs should be
indented six feet downward and covered with dirt."
-- Blair P. Houghton

CodeRed

unread,
Oct 29, 1997, 3:00:00 AM10/29/97
to

Alan E & Carmel J Brain wrote in message <34581F...@dynamite.com.au>...

>with TEXT_IO;
>procedure MAIN is
>begin
> TEXT_IO.PUT("Hello World")
> NEW_LINE(3);
>end;

He also wrote in another group that Ada and Pascal are hard to learn :)
Pascal is perhaps even easier (I know pascal pretty good, and Ada I'm
looking
to get into which is why I'm reading this newsgroup). But Ada looks pretty
cool.

>is impossibly hard, obsolete and "worse", XOR it's a troll. Given the
>pre-pubescent "X sucks Y rules" header, you're right in either case.

Truth is, I've learned all major languages (and some not major) like:
Super Easy, Basic, Pascal, C, C++, Cobol, and Assembly (for x86).

I've found C and C++ to be very hard to be productive in, and Pascal to be
the
easiest to be productive in. Truthfully, I liked ASM better then C++, but I
didn't
get into advanced things in either. I'm definitly interested in adding Ada
to my
list though, so if you could, can you e-mail me a place to download an Ada
compiler for x86's? (preferably Dos or Win95 because Linux was deleted
for lack of space).

Thank you, my e-mail is gri...@erols.com


Phlip C Plumlee

unread,
Oct 29, 1997, 3:00:00 AM10/29/97
to JT (from Fritz)

JT (from Fritz) wrote:

> I code a bit in C and C++ and the more I have to debug other people's
> C/C++
> the more I like Ada.

You might consider your choice of other people...

-- Phlip


David A. Frantz

unread,
Oct 29, 1997, 3:00:00 AM10/29/97
to

This sums up my thoughts, there are many C/C++ programs that are a nightmare
to understand from a maintenance stand point. Even a non ADA programmer
will get a sense for what a ADA program is doing after a quick look at the
code. A C++ programmer could have his own code in front of him and have
a Maintenance nightmare!

Dave

JT (from Fritz) wrote in message <3457E8B3...@shsu.edu>...

Adam Beneschan

unread,
Oct 29, 1997, 3:00:00 AM10/29/97
to

"Dann Corbit" <dco...@solutionsiq.com> writes:
>John Black wrote in message <34566fe...@news.mindspring.com>...

>>You guys say what you want but it's true. ADA is good for nothing.
>>C++, on the other hand, is the only language you need.
>Boy, this is just great. The "C or C++" thread was not good enough.
>Now that it has passed the previous world record for spam
>harvesting, we pull Ada and Java into the mix. Pretty please, down
>on my knees, I'm begging you to trim comp.lang.c from the header
>when replying to this post.

Not good enough. Not *nearly* good enough. I'm on my knees begging
you all to trim ALL the newsgroups from the header when responding.
In other words, send your responses to /dev/null. This guy is just
interested in inciting anger, and responding just satisfies his desire
for attention.

-- Adam


W. Wesley Groleau x4923

unread,
Oct 29, 1997, 3:00:00 AM10/29/97
to

It is written:

"Never attribute to malice that which can be adequately explained
by stupidity"

To which I add:

"Never answer malice which is clearly accompanied by stupidity."

So will you guys please stop answering John Black? Or at least
change the subject line and change from news to mail.

--
----------------------------------------------------------------------
Wes Groleau, Hughes Defense Communications, Fort Wayne, IN USA
Senior Software Engineer - AFATDS Tool-smith Wanna-be
wwgrol AT pseserv3.fw.hac.com

Don't send advertisements to this domain unless asked! All disk space
on fw.hac.com hosts belongs to either Hughes Defense Communications or
the United States government. Using email to store YOUR advertising
on them is trespassing!
----------------------------------------------------------------------

Nat Pryce

unread,
Oct 29, 1997, 3:00:00 AM10/29/97
to

Shombe Kroll wrote:
>
> Hello everyone, I hate to say it but my sentiments are with Mr. Black to a
> small degree.

I'm trying to understand your thought processes...

> My first programming class in college was in ADA and I found
> it very difficult to learn because of the lack of documentation and help

> aids for the language. That forced me to rely on my Professor for help


> which unfortunately was like pulling teeth. The lack of being able to
> obtain outside sources from my local computer store ie : "ADA for Dummies"
> left me with a feeling of complete frustration while I spent the semester
> copying and reediting code from my fellow struggling classmates in order to
> pass the course.

Hmm... so Ada is crap because your teacher is not helpful and your
nearest
bookstore has a small selection of books? Did you ever think of
*ordering*
a good book on Ada?

> However, struggling with ADA did give me an appreciation for the process of
> writing source code, and I have found that the fundamentals that I learned
> with ADA are applicable to me as I learn C++. <-- By the way this time I am
> writing my own code),

So, you think that C++ is good because you have already learnt the
basics of
programming?

Have you ever considered that *programming* is difficult? Whether you
learn
in Ada or C++, there is a learning curve to climb. Once you have
understood
the principles then any language becomes easier to learn. You might
very well
have learnt the languages the other way round, in which case you would
be
on the opposite side of this flame-fest :-)

--
+------------------------------------------+---------------------+
| Name: Nat Pryce MEng ACGI | Dept. of Computing, |
| Email: n...@doc.ic.ac.uk | Imperial College, |
| Tel: +44 (0)171 594 8394 | 180 Queen's Gate, |
| Fax: +44 (0)171 581 8024 | London SW7 2BZ, |
| WWW: http://www-dse.doc.ic.ac.uk/~np2 | United Kingdom |
+------------------------------------------+---------------------+

Kaz Kylheku

unread,
Oct 29, 1997, 3:00:00 AM10/29/97
to

In article <345673af...@news.mindspring.com>,

John Black <nospam@nospam> wrote:
>ADA and Pascal are two of the most useless inventions Man has ever
>wasted space on this planet with. These languages are hard to learn,

Nothing personal, but you must be seriously retarded if you find _Pascal_ hard
to learn. It's a teaching language for programming neophytes!

What's more likely is not that you are retarded, but that you have never tried
learning Pascal or writing a program in it. It's even more likely that you are
too young to remember Pascal.

>have zero applications, and people who only know these languages can

The TeX document processing system was written in Pascal.

Ada is used in all kinds of embedded systems and military applications. I know
at least one huge air traffic control system that is developed in Ada.

John Bode

unread,
Oct 29, 1997, 3:00:00 AM10/29/97
to

In article <636m6l$5...@bgtnsc01.worldnet.att.net>, "Shombe Kroll"
<Sho...@worldnet.att.net> wrote:

> Hello everyone, I hate to say it but my sentiments are with Mr. Black to a

> small degree. My first programming class in college was in ADA and I found


> it very difficult to learn because of the lack of documentation and help
> aids for the language.

I had the exact same experience, but the language was C.

> That forced me to rely on my Professor for help
> which unfortunately was like pulling teeth. The lack of being able to
> obtain outside sources from my local computer store ie : "ADA for Dummies"
> left me with a feeling of complete frustration while I spent the semester
> copying and reediting code from my fellow struggling classmates in order to
> pass the course.

I had the exact same experience, but the language was C.

> However, struggling with ADA did give me an appreciation for the process of
> writing source code, and I have found that the fundamentals that I learned
> with ADA are applicable to me as I learn C++. <-- By the way this time I am
> writing my own code),
>

Having learned C before Ada, I too found Ada overy picky -- at first.
However, after writing several thousand lines of code, I came to appreciate
it. Yes, Ada has a steeper *initial* learning curve than C. The tradeoff
comes after several months of practice. With Ada, the learning curve
tapers off rather quickly, whereas with C or C++, the learning curve is
flatter -- it's easier to get started coding, but it takes a longer time to
become truly *proficient* with the language.

So why isn't Ada in more widespread use? Ada compilers, being somewhat
larger and more complex than C compilers, are likewise more expensive. Ada
was never marketed toward business -- it was designed for a specific
problem domain, and some of the more esoteric features were not perceived
to be immediately valuable (unfortunately -- hell, the exception handling
mechanism *alone* could simplify things by orders of magnitude). The Ada
development environment typically requires more horsepower than the C
development environment -- up until very recently, *serious* Ada
development required workstation-class machines.

But the *biggest* reason C is in such demand? Inertia. People started
using C for no other reason than it was available and it was cheap and you
could develop C code on an AT-class machine. It certainly wasn't for
technical superiority. Over the past twenty years, a *lot* of code has
been written in C, so you need a lot of developers familiar with C to
maintain it, and since all they know is C, all new development is done in
C, etc., etc., etc.

Suddenly, along comes C++, and all that C experience gets leveraged into
what appears to be a fully buzzword-compliant OOL that, in reality, falls
short of what an OOL could and should be. Ada certainly isn't the be-all
and end-all of OOP, but I find it a lot easier to deal with than C++.

JT (from Fritz)

unread,
Oct 29, 1997, 3:00:00 AM10/29/97
to

NOSPAM_...@sm.luth.se

unread,
Oct 30, 1997, 3:00:00 AM10/30/97
to

John Black <nospam@nospam> wrote:
>ADA and Pascal are two of the most useless inventions Man has ever
>wasted space on this planet with. These languages are hard to learn,
>have zero applications, and people who only know these languages can
>only find jobs at Taco Bell! Smart programmers spend their time
>learning only C, C++, and Java in that order.

Are you kidding?!? One of Pascal:s strengths is that the language
ENFORCES sound programming habits. C++, on the other hand, is based
on the philosophy that no programming paradigm is better than another.
C++ perhaps has the advantage of being more important than Pascal in
the industry, but that is changing more and more when people realize
that other languages often make it possible to deliver code faster,
code that has fewer bugs and is easier to maintain and extend.

I like Java, Pascal and Eiffel.

Just my two cents...

--

Erik Alapaeae
email: NOSPAM_...@sm.luth.se


Alan Brain

unread,
Oct 30, 1997, 3:00:00 AM10/30/97
to

In which case, may I ask you to spend some of your time having a squizz
at Ada? The Lovelace turorial via http://www.adahome.com for example. I
just wish there was a tutorial this good for Eiffel.

--
Not the Australian Dairy Farmers Association,
the Australian Defence Force Academy.
aeb...@dynamite.com.au abr...@cs.adfa.oz.au

Alan Brain

unread,
Oct 30, 1997, 3:00:00 AM10/30/97
to CodeRed

CodeRed wrote:


> I'm definitly interested in adding Ada
> to my
> list though, so if you could, can you e-mail me a place to download an Ada
> compiler for x86's? (preferably Dos or Win95 because Linux was deleted
> for lack of space).

try http://www.adahome.com

This has links to all sorts of useful places (like the Public Ada
Library which contains several free/shareware Ada compilers for DOS).
More to the point for newsgroups other than comp.lang.ada, it's a great
place to get to things like CMM, Mil-Std-498 (the base of IEEE
standard on Software Life Cycle), Software Metrics et alia. Which are
good no matter what language you use.

NOSPAM_...@sm.luth.se

unread,
Oct 30, 1997, 3:00:00 AM10/30/97
to

Alan Brain <abr...@cs.adfa.oz.au> wrote:

>at Ada? The Lovelace turorial via http://www.adahome.com for example. I
>just wish there was a tutorial this good for Eiffel.

The old version ao Bertrand Meyers book on OO and Eiffel, I think it is
called "Object-Oriented Software Construction" has a great language-
independent intro on OO, the best I've ever seen!

Greetings

Bob Horvath

unread,
Oct 30, 1997, 3:00:00 AM10/30/97
to

Steve Ropa wrote:

I have often wondered the same thing. I head people talk about IDEs and
coming from a vi/make environment, I wonder what I am missing, if anything.
Perhaps these are two different things.

It seems to me that if you know language, you don't need an IDE. And if you
need an IDE, then you don't know the language.


Dr E. Buxbaum

unread,
Oct 30, 1997, 3:00:00 AM10/30/97
to

John Black wrote:
>
> ADA and Pascal are two of the most useless inventions Man has ever
> wasted space on this planet with. These languages are hard to learn,
> have zero applications, and people who only know these languages can
> only find jobs at Taco Bell! Smart programmers spend their time
> learning only C, C++, and Java in that order.

The Modula-3 FAQ reports an interesting experiment: Students of a
programming class were given an assignment to be completed by a
specified date. They were given the choice of 3 implementation
languages: Modula-3, Borland Pascal and C++. Modula-3 was the recomended
language, and most of the programming novices choose that. All students
which choose C++ had previous knowledge of this language and rated
themselfs as "experienced programmers".

The results were as follows: From the students who choose Modula-3, 4
out of 5 completed their assignment on time. With Borland Pascal, 2 out
of 3 managed to do this. From the students using C++, none did. Even
after been given an extension to complete their project, these students
delivered code of inferior quality compared to those using Modula and
Pascal.

In other words: Novices using Modula produced better code quicker, than
"experienced programmers" using C++!

On the jobs issue, it is certainly true that there are plenty of jobs
for C and C++ programmers. However, there are also lots of jobs for
people using Borland Pascal or Delphi, and if you want to do anything
for the US goverment, than you better know your Ada. Few people would
dare to programm mission critical applications (like nuclear power plant
or weapons system control software) in C, objective C or C++, and I
would not expect Java to turn out any different.

Larry Kilgallen

unread,
Oct 30, 1997, 3:00:00 AM10/30/97
to

In article <345881C4...@horvath.com>, Bob Horvath <b...@horvath.com> writes:

> It seems to me that if you know language, you don't need an IDE. And if you
> need an IDE, then you don't know the language.

In my experience IDEs are most helpful not with the language but with
the environment. Just because I know Ada, that does not mean I know
everything about calling Win32S, or MacApp, or Motif. If my goal is to
have my Ada program run on multiple platforms, IDEs could be a blessing
in making my otherwise correct software run in these environments.

Unfortunately, the best IDEs are often not oriented toward standardized
languages. Consider Think Pascal and Delphi, the leading dialects of
Pascal on their respective platforms in their prime, but vastly different
languages. Visual Basic supports another language without a strong
tradition of adherence to standards. And even Visual C++ is for a
language whose standard is still in committee.

Larry Kilgallen

t...@panix.com

unread,
Oct 30, 1997, 3:00:00 AM10/30/97
to

On Thu, 30 Oct 1997 13:34:24 +1100, Alan Brain <abr...@cs.adfa.oz.au>
wrote:

>NOSPAM_...@sm.luth.se wrote:


>>
>> John Black <nospam@nospam> wrote:
>> >ADA and Pascal are two of the most useless inventions Man has ever
>> >wasted space on this planet with. These languages are hard to learn,
>> >have zero applications, and people who only know these languages can
>> >only find jobs at Taco Bell! Smart programmers spend their time
>> >learning only C, C++, and Java in that order.

Apparently you havn't tried TMT Pascal. Check it out on www.tmt.com
Also please not that average debugging time for a Pascal Program is
about 1/4 what it is with C. This "secret" is known, but apparently
not as well known as it might be.


>>
>> Are you kidding?!? One of Pascal:s strengths is that the language
>> ENFORCES sound programming habits. C++, on the other hand, is based
>> on the philosophy that no programming paradigm is better than another.
>> C++ perhaps has the advantage of being more important than Pascal in
>> the industry, but that is changing more and more when people realize
>> that other languages often make it possible to deliver code faster,
>> code that has fewer bugs and is easier to maintain and extend.
>>
>> I like Java, Pascal and Eiffel.
>
>In which case, may I ask you to spend some of your time having a squizz

>at Ada? The Lovelace turorial via http://www.adahome.com for example. I
>just wish there was a tutorial this good for Eiffel.
>

Kaz Kylheku

unread,
Oct 30, 1997, 3:00:00 AM10/30/97
to

In article <3458072B...@deltanet.com>,
Phlip C Plumlee <te...@deltanet.com> wrote:
>You might consider your choice of other people...

When you graduate from elementary school, you might realize that that choice
isn't as easy as choosing schooyard friends.

Making that choice might mean quitting your job which pays the bills.

I have to side with JT: C and C++ are languages suited to the lone guru who
perfects code in isolation. Many programmers who write in these languages are
just code butchers who don't understand the languages. They assume that a long
integer is four bytes long, that incrementing a maximum integer wraps back to
the minimum, that main() can have any old return value, that pointers all have
the same representation and hence void ** is a generic pointer to pointer, that
string literals are modifiable, that arrays are really pointers, a byte is
exactly eight bits, that plain chars are unsigned, that one can check
feof(stream) without first attempting a read operation, and so on ad nauseum.

W. Wesley Groleau x4923

unread,
Oct 30, 1997, 3:00:00 AM10/30/97
to

> 1. The portability issue. C/C++ are basically portable across
> platforms,

Consider the languages you are comparing to (see newsgroups line)
that's a pretty ignorant claim. Ada is the most portable of the above
languages. Rarely do I need to change anything in an Ada program
when I change operating systems, CPUs, or compiler vendors. With
C on the other hand, I recently had to track down the new location
of a .h file because the O.S. vendor decided between versions that
they didn't like the path they chose before. (Not only that, but they
changed the return value of sprintf, from the string written in, to
the number of chars written.) Java was intended to be the most portable
of all, but Microsoft is trying hard to prevent that.

> 2. Pascal and Ada (which is often called a highly enriched Pascal)
> weren't designed as application development vehicles - whereas C/C++
> were.

Another untrue claim. True, Pascal was designed to support teaching,
but Ada was _designed_ to support known-to-be-effective principles for
devloping applications--as you said in your own self-contradiction
following. C and C++ were partly designed and partly thrown
together to support whatever thing the few people involved thought was
cool at the time. Many of these "coolnesses" have long been proven
counter-productive. Many of the ones that have any value were in Ada
long before they were in C or C++. Many of the bad ones were
intentionally
omitted from Ada and more recently from Java. (In fairness, note that
he (Mike C.) contradicts the above claim in the following.)

> Ada, OTOH, was designed for implementation of secure and fail-safe
> systems for the Government. It was based on Pascal concepts (very strong
> typing, modularity, consistency, etc.), but was taken much farther than

> was useful to the general world. ....

> .... Learning Ada should be considered an


> educational experience, at best, because no one uses it.

No one? The ignorance is showing again.

--
----------------------------------------------------------------------
Wes Groleau, Hughes Defense Communications, Fort Wayne, IN USA
Senior Software Engineer - AFATDS Tool-smith Wanna-be

The Ten Commandments of C:
I. Thou shalt run 'lint' frequently and study its pronouncements
with care, for verily its perception and judgement oft exceed thine.

II. Thou shalt repeatedly and loudly condemn those languages that
behave in a manner like 'lint', for verily they do implement the
plotting of the wicked which desire to take away thy freedom and
thy perception, yea, even thy judgment.
----------------------------------------------------------------------

John Rickard

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Oct 30, 1997, 3:00:00 AM10/30/97
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John Black <nospam@nospam> wrote:
>ADA and Pascal are two of the most useless inventions Man has ever
>wasted space on this planet with. These languages are hard to
learn,
>have zero applications, and people who only know these languages can

Apparently you are again one of the infamous stuck up C programmers
who think they are a programming god... well i got a newsflasg for
you... i own Turbo Pascal, Turbo C++ and of course QuickBasic...
i have/am successfully learning QuickBasic and Pascal... the c++ on
the other hand... blah... language is a matter of preference...
I like basic, pascal, and some scripting languages like Visual
DialogScript...
that is my preference... but do you see me in the C newsgroup saying
C and C++ SUCK. Basic, Pascal, and Script are the only languages you
need...
no you dont...
and about the zero applications...
my mother works for Noland co. a rather large HVAC Distributer
company(sells heating/cooling and bath stuff to small companies)
and i would have to inform you that every damn Load and Calculation
program they have(I am guessing(cant remember exact)about 30 programs
i have seen in use and read about) are all written in Pascal or other
Pascal-Like languages... the only thing on there computer even
written in C or C++ is the damn operating system...

oh heheh yeah this to:
Pascal is EASY to learn

Peter Seebach

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Oct 30, 1997, 3:00:00 AM10/30/97
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In article <3458D1...@pseserv3.fw.hac.com>,

W. Wesley Groleau x4923 <wwg...@pseserv3.fw.hac.com> wrote:
>Consider the languages you are comparing to (see newsgroups line)
>that's a pretty ignorant claim. Ada is the most portable of the above
>languages.

But only to the systems it's available for. If you talk about code
being portable to all implementations, great, but there are still
systems which have C compilers, but no Ada.

>Rarely do I need to change anything in an Ada program
>when I change operating systems, CPUs, or compiler vendors. With
>C on the other hand, I recently had to track down the new location
>of a .h file because the O.S. vendor decided between versions that
>they didn't like the path they chose before. (Not only that, but they
>changed the return value of sprintf, from the string written in, to
>the number of chars written.)

You can't have it both ways.

The C language, and every implementation of C, has had the same definition
of sprintf, and the same locations for all the headers, since 1989. If
you want to use compilers for similar languaes, and complain about the
portability of C, we get to taunt you about every implementation that's
ever claimed to be similar to Ada, too.

>Java was intended to be the most portable
>of all, but Microsoft is trying hard to prevent that.

Java is intended to produce executables and programs which are portable
across all implementations; this does not necessarily make it a widely
portable language.

>C and C++ were partly designed and partly thrown
>together to support whatever thing the few people involved thought was
>cool at the time.

Speak for C++. :) C has a bit of history, but is really fairly
consistent. :)

-s
--
se...@plethora.net -- Speaking for myself. No spam please.
Copyright 1997. All rights reserved. This was not written by my cat.
C/Unix wizard - send mail for help! -- <URL:http://www.plethora.net/~seebs>
<URL:http://www.plethora.net/> - More Net, Less Spam!

John Gluth

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Oct 30, 1997, 3:00:00 AM10/30/97
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In article <MPG.ec125666...@news.primenet.com> Mike Copeland,

mrc...@primenet.com writes:
>Learning Ada should be considered an
>educational experience, at best, because no one uses it.

Dang...what HAVE I been doing then, these past few years?

You ever fly on the 777? The flight control system is in Ada.
If you land in Canada, their air traffic control system is (or will
be...not
sure if it's been delivered) in Ada.
We fly missiles with Ada. Shoot 'em down with Ada, too...

But hey, I've never done an applet for the web in Ada, or anything else
important like that...

Kaz Kylheku

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Oct 30, 1997, 3:00:00 AM10/30/97
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In article <3459AC...@dynamite.com.au>,
Alan E & Carmel J Brain <aeb...@dynamite.com.au> wrote:

>Mike Copeland wrote:
>>
>> This has almost nothing to do with the "ease of learning" either
>> language (and I feel C/C++ is much harder to do so than Pascal), but by
>> some other factors:
>> 1. The portability issue. C/C++ are basically portable across
>> platforms, and this is an extremely important issue to corporate
>> thinking.
>
>While I agree with most of your post, I must take issue here. C and C++
>are perceived as being portable. Inasmuch as there are almost no major

No. C is perceived as being portable. Those who perceive C++ as portable
are naive or mistaken.

>computers which don't have a C or C++ compiler, this is true. And that's
>a big, big selling point.

>Now C++ on the other hand, written using CodeWarrior 10 on a Mac, ported
>to CodeWarrior 10 on an IBM... or even MVC++ 4 vs MVC++ 5... or worse
>still CodeWarrior 9 on a Mac to CodeWarrior 10 on a Mac to MVC++ 5 on an
>IBM... In 15,000 LOCs of C++ how many would you reasonably expect to
>have to be changed? (yes, these were actual examples too)

C++ is not C however. What are your experiences with porting ANSI/ISO C code
from one ISO compiler to another?

C++ is not a standardized language, unlike Ada 83 or Ada 95, so you would
expect to have porting problems with it. C has been standardized for close to a
decade.

Even though it's easy to introduce machine dependencies into C or C++ code, I
would expect that most of your C++ headaches would be related to a lack of
standardization, or the different pace of adaptation of the draft features by
various vendors. (That alone is, to me, reason enough to avoid C++ if I can).

C porting headaches usually stem from legacy ``classic'' C code, in which the
chief difficulty is bugs uncovered when one adds function prototypes. Then
there are dependencies of implementation characteristics: byte order, size of
various types, and so forth. Mind you, it's also possible to write Ada
programs with similar dependencies.

Then there are uses of non-portable functions that are not in the standard
library. E.g. it's impossible to port an XWindow application to Microsoft
Windows without rewriting portions of it, but it's not really the fault of the
underlying language.

Shmuel (Seymour J.) Metz

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Oct 30, 1997, 3:00:00 AM10/30/97
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Adam Beneschan wrote:
>
> I once heard of a computer language named TROLL; I have no idea what
> it's like, but I think you should look into it. I'll bet it's
> something you'd really enjoy programming in.

Why? John sounds like a JOVIAL person, even if he does prefer the
"language that dares not speak its name".

--

Shmuel (Seymour J.) Metz
Senior Software SE

The values in from and reply-to are for the benefit of spammers:
reply to domain eds.com, user msustys1.smetz or to domain gsg.eds.com,
user smetz. Do not reply to spam...@library.lspace.org

Shmuel (Seymour J.) Metz

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Oct 30, 1997, 3:00:00 AM10/30/97
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Steve Ropa wrote:

> As you said, it all boils down to the right tool for the right job. What
> types of jobs are Ada best suited for? I got into development through self
> learning, so I never really had the benefit of experiencing a lot of
> different languages.

One very importnat point is to worry about the efficiency of your
algoriths before you worry about the efficiency of your compilers. I was
once tasked with rewriting a low level graphics routine to improve its
performance. The old, slow, version was in Intel 80286 assembler
language. My new faster version was in Ada.

Could I have made it even faster by doing it in assembler? Absolutely.
Would it have been cost effective to do so? Not bloody likely.

Unfortunately, my Ada experience is limited to Ada 83, which had serious
limitations in character processing and in multithreading. But for most
tasks I'd pick it over C/C++ in a heartbeat.

Where C/C++ has an edge is that there is more likely to be existing
bindings for complex environments, e.g., WinDoze. If I had to interface
with ms software then I would probably hold my nose and use C++.

For an environment where the compiler is affordable, I prefer PL/I.
Also, there are specialized languages like ICON and SETL that do what
they do much better than any of the more common languages. Learn a lot
of different languages and you'll be in a better position to judge such
issues.

Al Christians

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Oct 30, 1997, 3:00:00 AM10/30/97
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> > Ada, OTOH, was designed for implementation of secure and fail-safe
> > systems for the Government. It was based on Pascal concepts (very strong
> > typing, modularity, consistency, etc.), but was taken much farther than
> > was useful to the general world. ....

There has been some (more) bad press about DOD technology lately.
Computerworld recently ran a story about an Army battlefield management
system of some kind that has been under development since 1980 (some
kids who weren't even born when it started might do better) and still
doesn't work real good. But it's only something like a $760 million
debacle for the taxpayers, which, spread over 17 years, is much less
than we are used to paying. Of course, it was started before Ada came
down the pipe, but has Ada been used in this project at all? If so, why
didn't it help? If not, whynot? Can anybody explain how the DOD keeps
doing things (for 17 years!) to lower the regard of sensible people
everywhere for the things (like Ada) in which they invest between wars?

Al

Charles Hixson

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Oct 30, 1997, 3:00:00 AM10/30/97
to Bob Horvath

Bob Horvath wrote:

> Steve Ropa wrote:
>
> /* snip */


> I have often wondered the same thing. I head people talk about IDEs and
> coming from a vi/make environment, I wonder what I am missing, if anything.
> Perhaps these are two different things.
>

> It seems to me that if you know language, you don't need an IDE. And if you
> need an IDE, then you don't know the language.

Wizards are excellent tools for doing frequent tasks with lots of details. One
shouldn't NEED a wizard, but they can sure speed thing up. They also, if well
done, considerably decrease debugging time. In a good system the wizard will
generate the code, and surround it with markers. As long as you don't remove
the markers, the wizard will expect to be able to parse and regenerate the code
freely (in case you edit the "screen image"). Once you decide to get into the
details, you just remove the markers, and then you can edit the code as
desired. This can be LOTS faster than creating everything from scratch, and IF
the purpose is to design a visual image, then a visual design editor definitely
the best way to go.
--
Charles Hixson charle...@earthling.net
(510) 464-7733 or chi...@mtc.dst.ca.us

Shmuel (Seymour J.) Metz

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Oct 30, 1997, 3:00:00 AM10/30/97
to

Mike Copeland wrote:

> 1. The portability issue. C/C++ are basically portable across
> platforms,

NOT! You are confusing portability of the compiler for the language with
portability of applications written in the language. C is full of things
that are implimentation defined, e.g., "long", whereas Ada lets you
easily define precision in a platform-independent fashion. And, yes, I
know that you can mask those deficiencies of C by using the
preprocessor, but that just adds another layer of complexity that isn't
needed in Ada.

> 2. Pascal and Ada (which is often called a highly enriched Pascal)
> weren't designed as application development vehicles - whereas C/C++
> were.

Wrong on both counts. Ada was designed for applications development, and
C was designed to be easily compilable on a small machine.

> Pascal was invented as a teaching tool for structured and module
> problem solving, to show and overcome the faults of weakly typed and
> inherently undisciplined coding languages of the past (e.g. COBOL,
> ForTran, BASIC, assembler, etc.).

Actually, ALGOL 60 had already done that.

> Ada, OTOH, was designed for implementation of secure and fail-safe
> systems for the Government. It was based on Pascal concepts (very strong
> typing, modularity, consistency, etc.), but was taken much farther than

> was useful to the general world. Learning Ada should be considered an


> educational experience, at best, because no one uses it.

Correct, no one but business, education and government uses it. This
news group wouldn't exist if no one used Ada, nor would publishers
bother with books about it.

> And I agree it's very hard to learn and work with, even coming from a
> Pascal background.

Really? I found Ada to be a snap to learn; perhaps Ada 95 is more
difficult? I certainly found Ada 83 to be far more natural than C ;-)

John Rickard

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Oct 30, 1997, 3:00:00 AM10/30/97
to

can you guys take these idiotic flames to alt.flame...
i am here to learn/help/etc.. and it is damn near impossible with all
of this bickering...
--
--
Remove .DONTSPAMME from my
email address to send me REAL email.
--

Al Christians <ach...@easystreet.com> wrote in article
<345904...@easystreet.com>...
: > > Ada, OTOH, was designed for implementation of secure and


fail-safe
: > > systems for the Government. It was based on Pascal concepts
(very strong
: > > typing, modularity, consistency, etc.), but was taken much
farther than

: > > was useful to the general world. ....

:

Kaz Kylheku

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Oct 30, 1997, 3:00:00 AM10/30/97
to

In article <1997Oct30.094442.1@eisner>,

Larry Kilgallen <Kilg...@eisner.decus.org.nospam> wrote:
>In article <345881C4...@horvath.com>, Bob Horvath <b...@horvath.com> writes:
>
>> It seems to me that if you know language, you don't need an IDE. And if you
>> need an IDE, then you don't know the language.
>
>In my experience IDEs are most helpful not with the language but with
>the environment. Just because I know Ada, that does not mean I know
>everything about calling Win32S, or MacApp, or Motif. If my goal is to

That's what reference manuals are for, no?

>have my Ada program run on multiple platforms, IDEs could be a blessing
>in making my otherwise correct software run in these environments.

How would an IDE in one environment help your program work on another platform?
It seems like an IDE would just induce you to make your program specific to one
platform, particularly if it has ``easy'' procedures for adding extensions
to your program or for generating UI code for you, and such.

Jon S Anthony

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Oct 30, 1997, 3:00:00 AM10/30/97
to

nospam@nospam (John Black) writes:

>
> Then why do the want ads for C, C++ programmers could stretch from
> here to the moon, while Ada/Pascal programmers are nonexistent? Like
> I said, if you program in Ada or Pascal, your best job is going to be
> taking orders at Red Lobster.

I have this overwhelming impression that you either are or soon will
be taking orders at Red Lobster or flippin' burgers at MuckDucks...
Certainly no one in their right mind would even consider hiring
someone like you for anything approaching an swe job or even a lowly
programmer job.

/Jon

--
Jon Anthony
Synquiry Technologies, Ltd., Belmont, MA 02178, 617.484.3383
"Nightmares - Ha! The way my life's been going lately,
Who'd notice?" -- Londo Mollari

Jon S Anthony

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Oct 30, 1997, 3:00:00 AM10/30/97
to

nospam@nospam (John Black) writes:

> You guys say what you want but it's true. ADA is good for nothing.
> C++, on the other hand, is the only language you need.

Any particular reason why anyone should give one rat's ass for your
opinion? Any reason why you "think" the whole world should be
subjected to your overly cross posted and empty opinion?

Maybe the thread title should be "Megalomaniacal idiots (such as John
Black) SUCK, Intelligent people with some discretion RULE."

/Jon

>
> You guys say what you want but it's true. ADA is good for nothing.
> C++, on the other hand, is the only language you need.

Kaz Kylheku

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Oct 30, 1997, 3:00:00 AM10/30/97
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In article <Pine.SUN.3.96.971030...@flatland.dimensional.com>,
Steve Ropa <ther...@dimensional.com> wrote:
>As far as daring to use C or C++ for mission critical systems, I would
>point out that the majority of the telecommunications systems in the world
>are running on top of Unix, which as we all know is written in C. I
>myself(along with a half dozen other team members) have written several
>long distance Network Management systems in C++. My team is about to
>start on a Satellite communications system in C++. Oddly, it is replacing
>a system written in Ada. This is not to put down Ada, as I feel every
>language has its place. Just don't rule out the stability and reliability
>of C or C++.

A failure in a network management system doesn't actually amount to a real
catastrophy. It just means that you are perhaps not getting timely visibility
of some operational measurements or alarms, or an interruption in your ability
to control network elements. Only if such a condition is prolonged can it lead
to a failure to diagnose and possibly correct some fault in the network, such
as congestion due to to out of service units.

Telecommunication management software is large and complex, but not safety
critical, and quasi-real-time at best. Shut-down software for a nuclear reactor
may be less complex, but requires much more verification.

Ed Muldoon

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Oct 30, 1997, 3:00:00 AM10/30/97
to

You have been much too hard on John Black. He is performing a valuable
service for all of us. One John_Black_type (and he is a generic type,
although I'm sure he's uncomfortable about it) can easily provide
employment for two other people as they clean up the messes he leaves
behind. This increases the demand for our services and drives up our
incomes. In the end, we all owe a lot to the John_Black_type.

WARNING: Too many instantiations of the John_Black_type in a company can
lead to serious financial difficulties for that company.

Bob Horvath

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Oct 30, 1997, 3:00:00 AM10/30/97
to


David A. Frantz wrote:

> Bob Horvath wrote in message <345881C4...@horvath.com>...


> >Steve Ropa wrote:
> >
> >> On 28 Oct 1997, Robert S. White wrote:
> >>
> >> > Ada's current weak points, IMHO / IME, are in "wizard smart" GUI
> >> > code generation.
> >>
> >> Personally, I would like to see less emphasis on wizards anyway. I have
> >> had too many developers tell me they knew what they were doing, but when
> I
> >> took their wizards away, they were lost!
> >

> >I have often wondered the same thing. I head people talk about IDEs and
> >coming from a vi/make environment, I wonder what I am missing, if anything.
> >Perhaps these are two different things.
> >

> >It seems to me that if you know language, you don't need an IDE. And if
> you
> >need an IDE, then you don't know the language.
> >
>

> An IDE in my opinion has nothing to do with knowing the language. An IDE
> if successful should make the programmer more productive! Can't really
> see the relationship of the user interface, wether a make/command line
> environment or a fancy IDE, to knowing the lanquage.

How do they make you more productive? I've never used one. I have seen CASE
tools years ago that I thought were very unproductive. Perhaps I don't know
what I am missing, but I can't imagine anything really helping out, except for
something that might make building GUIs a little easier, but for the guts of an
application, what do they buy you?


Bob Horvath

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Oct 30, 1997, 3:00:00 AM10/30/97
to

Peter Seebach wrote:

> In article <3458D1...@pseserv3.fw.hac.com>,
> W. Wesley Groleau x4923 <wwg...@pseserv3.fw.hac.com> wrote:
> >Consider the languages you are comparing to (see newsgroups line)
> >that's a pretty ignorant claim. Ada is the most portable of the above
> >languages.
>
> But only to the systems it's available for. If you talk about code
> being portable to all implementations, great, but there are still
> systems which have C compilers, but no Ada.

I have heard of an Ada to Java bytecode compiler, so now I guess you can have
Ada everywhere!

> Java is intended to produce executables and programs which are portable
> across all implementations; this does not necessarily make it a widely
> portable language.

I don't understand this statement.

> >C and C++ were partly designed and partly thrown
> >together to support whatever thing the few people involved thought was
> >cool at the time.
>
> Speak for C++. :) C has a bit of history, but is really fairly
> consistent. :)

Hmmmm. How big is an int?


Scott Baierl

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Oct 30, 1997, 3:00:00 AM10/30/97
to

Xu Yifeng wrote in message <3456A3...@public.hz.zj.cn>...


>John Black wrote:
>>
>> ADA and Pascal are two of the most useless inventions Man has ever
>> wasted space on this planet with. These languages are hard to learn,
>> have zero applications, and people who only know these languages can

>> only find jobs at Taco Bell! Smart programmers spend their time
>> learning only C, C++, and Java in that order.
>

>Let Pascal and ADA exist in the world, otherwise, we won't feel C/C++
>is better language.
>
>Regards,
>Xu Yifeng

Smart programmers spend their time learning programming languages that help
them solve the real-world problems in their particular application domain.

I know Pascal, C, C++, COBOL, Fortran, Java, Basic and several variants of
Assembler. None of them is difficult to learn. Each language has its
strong and weak points. I happen to think that C++ is probably the most
versatile language of the bunch, which is why I use it more than the others.
Making statements as to the relative utility of langauges is a waste of
time. Passing judgement about the intelligence of the users of such
languages is contemptible.

I don't think we need any more biggots.

Corey Barcus

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Oct 30, 1997, 3:00:00 AM10/30/97
to


John Black wrote:

> ADA and Pascal are two of the most useless inventions Man has ever
> wasted space on this planet with. These languages are hard to learn,
> have zero applications, and people who only know these languages can
> only find jobs at Taco Bell! Smart programmers spend their time
> learning only C, C++, and Java in that order.

This is total hyperbole. Ada is used heavily in the US DoD, probably many
other places. Pascal has its current incarnation in a product called
Delphi (from Borland of course) that is a very good tool for building
Windows applications.

Why not dispense with this ignorant and inflamatory position? Instead ask
others if Ada is indeed difficult to learn as you suspect (coming from a
C/C++/Java background I found it somewhat confusing), where it's used,
where's Pascal used, etc. I'm sure advocates of these other languages
would be more than happy to give you answers.

It may very well be that C/C++/Java is best suited for what you endeavor
to do. It would be well to know that there are many ways to program and
some languages are much better suited to particular problems. There are
reasons why languages like Forth, ML, Prolog, Smalltalk, Lisp, etc exist.
If you want to learn something, it's better to try and formulate a
question.

--
Corey Barcus
Simpler Software
co...@simplersw.com

Kenneth W. Sodemann

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Oct 30, 1997, 3:00:00 AM10/30/97
to

Sorry about the multiple posts there. Minor malfunction with either my news
reader, or the companies news server (it went down soon after).

--
with Std_Disclaimer; use Std_Disclaimer;
Signature.Put (Name => Ken Sodemann,
E_Mail => kwso...@avistainc.com
Web => http://www.pcii.net/~stuffel
Company_Web => http://www.avistainc.com);


Kenneth W. Sodemann

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Oct 30, 1997, 3:00:00 AM10/30/97
to

Steve Ropa wrote ...
>
>I hate to keep a thread going that started with such an inane comment(see
>subject) but *your* points were very well articulated, and lead me to a
>question.

>As you said, it all boils down to the right tool for the right job. What
>types of jobs are Ada best suited for?

Personally, all of the Ada based projects that I have worked on have been
real-time embedded avionics systems. Ada is a very good language for use in
these projects since these type of projects tend to be:

o Large scale -- many LOC, and many engineers
o Mission (or in this case, life) critical
o Maintained over several years.

Ada also allows low level access to the hardware, and produces efficient
object code, both of which are essential to those types of programs.

Having used two different Ada tools for Windows application development
(ObjectAda is one, the other is a soon to be released tool from a different
company), I would say that Ada would be a good fit for large scale
applications development also. However, the tools are not quite "up to par"
with a product like VC++ yet, and it would be harder to find developers, so
for small to medium sized Windows development projects, VC++ or VB is
probably a better choice (IMHO).

Marin David Condic, 561.796.8997, M/S 731-96

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Oct 30, 1997, 3:00:00 AM10/30/97
to

Mike Copeland <mrc...@PRIMENET.COM> writes:
> 1. The portability issue. C/C++ are basically portable across
>platforms, and this is an extremely important issue to corporate
>thinking. It's more important to the executives/decision makers of most
>companies that their key applications can be moved to other vendor's
>hardware when financial issues force such switches, than to have
>implementation languages which their programmers like and find easy to
>learn.
This seems to be misinformation. C was originally invented as a
systems programming language and for years had no standard at all.
Implementations varied quite a bit and many of the things that
were legal to do (and frequently done) were notoriously
non-portable. From practical experience in porting C programs
(albeit, not in the last couple of years) I can attest to the fact
that it is far more work than porting an equivalent Ada program.
If anybody considers C (and by extension C++) to be "portable"
then they ought to be extremely impressed with Ada since it is
much more rigorous in its language definition and designed with
portability as one of its major objectives.

> 2. Pascal and Ada (which is often called a highly enriched Pascal)
>weren't designed as application development vehicles - whereas C/C++

>were. Pascal was invented as a teaching tool for structured and module
<snip>
As stated above. C was developed as a systems programming language
which has dramatically different requirements from an applications
programming language. Arguably, C++ might have been oriented more
towards applications, but it's roots in C means its dragging along
many characteristics aimed at systems programming.

> Ada, OTOH, was designed for implementation of secure and fail-safe
>systems for the Government. It was based on Pascal concepts (very strong
>typing, modularity, consistency, etc.), but was taken much farther than

>was useful to the general world. Learning Ada should be considered an

>educational experience, at best, because no one uses it. And I agree


>it's very hard to learn and work with, even coming from a Pascal

>background. Nonetheless, Ada provides some interesting and useful things
>for any serious programmer to think about and use in his/her work.
>
I'd beg to differ on the "no one uses it" part of this statement.
While it seems obvious that other languages may be more widely
used than Ada, it is not as if there is no Ada programming going
on in the real world. It is a non-trivial market and I don't
expect it will disappear any time soon.

Hard to learn? Sure - there's features in the language that deal
with difficult concepts, such as multitasking/concurrency,
numerical analysis, et cetera. When you deal with difficult
concepts, you're going to find it difficult to learn. But I teach
an "Intro to Ada" in-house course aimed at engineers with a
familarity with other languages and it's not hard at all getting
them up to speed with a Pascal-like subset of the features.

The only area that gets difficult is teaching the use of the
generic I/O packages. (Forces you to discuss generic instantiation
early on and this always seems to be a difficult concept to get
across until some experience with the language is gained.) Text_IO
can be turgid, but by sticking to Put_Line and 'Image (EVERYTHING
ought to have a 'Image attribute!!!) you can get folks rolling on
basic terminal I/O without any more complication than trying to
teach the "printf" calls (and all its variants) in C.

The thing that bothers me about the "Hard To Learn" falacy is that
when you dig into it a little you tend to discover that it is a
variation of "It's not what I already know, so it's 'Hard To
Learn'" or "I'm used to a language that has no advanced features
so I find it 'Hard To Learn' a language that does." You can learn
the Pascal-like subset of Ada with no more difficulty than you
would experience learning Pascal - and all learning requires
effort and therefore, by definition is not going to be easy. (If
it were easy, everybody would do it.) When you've mastered the
Pascal-like subset, you can gradually add on features just like
you learned the more advanced, arcane, dark features of C. And no
language design is *ever* going to make concepts like concurrency
"simple" so you're going to have to bite the bullet and learn the
theory behind the advanced features before the features themselves
are going to make sense.

Language wars are futile, like most wars are, so we shouldn't
ought to start one. I don't mean to give the impression that
there's something wrong with preferring one language over another.
There's nothing wrong with saying "This is the language I know and
am comfortable with, so that's what I use to get my job done." But
in criticizing a language, there needs to be some emphasis on
avoiding vague generalities or subjective judgments.

MDC

Marin David Condic, Senior Computer Engineer Voice: 561.796.8997
Pratt & Whitney GESP, M/S 731-96, P.O.B. 109600 Fax: 561.796.4669
West Palm Beach, FL, 33410-9600 Internet: COND...@PWFL.COM
===============================================================================
"Having an open mind is nothing. The object of opening the mind, as
of opening the mouth, is to shut it again on something solid."
-- G.K. Chesterton
===============================================================================

Kaz Kylheku

unread,
Oct 30, 1997, 3:00:00 AM10/30/97
to

In article <jfbode-ya0233800...@news.earthlink.net>,
John Bode <jfb...@nospam.mail.earthlink.net> wrote:
>Having learned C before Ada, I too found Ada overy picky -- at first.
>However, after writing several thousand lines of code, I came to appreciate
>it. Yes, Ada has a steeper *initial* learning curve than C. The tradeoff
>comes after several months of practice. With Ada, the learning curve
>tapers off rather quickly, whereas with C or C++, the learning curve is
>flatter -- it's easier to get started coding, but it takes a longer time to
>become truly *proficient* with the language.

Is suspect that the difference has partly to do with the level of diagnosis. A
beginner in C or C++ is lulled into a sense that he or she is writing a correct
program just because the compiler accepts it.

But to actually become a student of C or C++ and learn the languages _properly_
takes a great deal of effort.

I can't say that I know ISO 9899:1990 C one hundred percent, even though I read
random sections of the standard practically on a daily basis.

>So why isn't Ada in more widespread use? Ada compilers, being somewhat
>larger and more complex than C compilers, are likewise more expensive. Ada

GNAT is 16 megabytes of Ada source code, I believe. :) Which probably
translates to roughly 5 or 6 megs of C due to the extra verbiage. :)

>was never marketed toward business -- it was designed for a specific
>problem domain, and some of the more esoteric features were not perceived
>to be immediately valuable (unfortunately -- hell, the exception handling
>mechanism *alone* could simplify things by orders of magnitude). The Ada
>development environment typically requires more horsepower than the C
>development environment -- up until very recently, *serious* Ada
>development required workstation-class machines.
>
>But the *biggest* reason C is in such demand? Inertia. People started
>using C for no other reason than it was available and it was cheap and you
>could develop C code on an AT-class machine. It certainly wasn't for

Or XT, even. :) Also, don't forget that even eight bit micros had C compilers
running on them. I didn't use C on an eight bit machine, but I did dare run
Borland's Turbo Pascal 3.0 on a Z80-based CP/M machine with 48K ram. :) The
compiler and executed code performed quite adequately, and with overlays it was
possible to run large programs. Real work was done in assembly language, of
course.

Steve Ropa

unread,
Oct 30, 1997, 3:00:00 AM10/30/97
to

On Thu, 30 Oct 1997, Bob Horvath wrote:

> Steve Ropa wrote:
>
> > On 28 Oct 1997, Robert S. White wrote:
> >
> > > Ada's current weak points, IMHO / IME, are in "wizard smart" GUI
> > > code generation.
> >
> > Personally, I would like to see less emphasis on wizards anyway. I have
> > had too many developers tell me they knew what they were doing, but when I
> > took their wizards away, they were lost!
>
> I have often wondered the same thing. I head people talk about IDEs and
> coming from a vi/make environment, I wonder what I am missing, if anything.
> Perhaps these are two different things.
>
> It seems to me that if you know language, you don't need an IDE. And if you
> need an IDE, then you don't know the language.
>

Well, I come from an IDE environment, and I do like some of the tools they
give you, but only as tools, not solutions(drives some of my programmers
nuts!) In my opinion, the only value of the wizards is to save some
typing. Even that can be fraught with danger, though.

What are you missing in IDEs? Some tools that make it easier to edit your
code. Although I know some people who can edit faster in vi than in any
IDE. I actually had one programmer buy a vi emulator for VC++ to increase
his productivity. Most IDEs also have a convenient way to organize and
access your files. In other words, if you are happy with vi and make,
you aren't missing a thing! i wouldn't say if you need an IDE you don't
know the language. I would say if you need a Wizard you don't know the
language.


Steve Ropa

unread,
Oct 30, 1997, 3:00:00 AM10/30/97
to

On Thu, 30 Oct 1997, Dr E. Buxbaum wrote:

> The Modula-3 FAQ reports an interesting experiment: Students of a
> programming class were given an assignment to be completed by a
> specified date. They were given the choice of 3 implementation
> languages: Modula-3, Borland Pascal and C++. Modula-3 was the recomended
> language, and most of the programming novices choose that. All students
> which choose C++ had previous knowledge of this language and rated
> themselfs as "experienced programmers".
>
> The results were as follows: From the students who choose Modula-3, 4
> out of 5 completed their assignment on time. With Borland Pascal, 2 out
> of 3 managed to do this. From the students using C++, none did. Even
> after been given an extension to complete their project, these students
> delivered code of inferior quality compared to those using Modula and
> Pascal.
>
> In other words: Novices using Modula produced better code quicker, than
> "experienced programmers" using C++!
>
> On the jobs issue, it is certainly true that there are plenty of jobs
> for C and C++ programmers. However, there are also lots of jobs for
> people using Borland Pascal or Delphi, and if you want to do anything
> for the US goverment, than you better know your Ada. Few people would
> dare to programm mission critical applications (like nuclear power plant
> or weapons system control software) in C, objective C or C++, and I
> would not expect Java to turn out any different.

Your example is fascinating. I wonder, though how "experienced" those C++
programmers were. Many people seem to think that just because they can
run a couple of wizards, they are C++ programmers. The end result is that
they don't learn the language, and are incapable of producing a high
quality product, on time or otherwise.

As far as daring to use C or C++ for mission critical systems, I would
point out that the majority of the telecommunications systems in the world
are running on top of Unix, which as we all know is written in C. I
myself(along with a half dozen other team members) have written several
long distance Network Management systems in C++. My team is about to
start on a Satellite communications system in C++. Oddly, it is replacing
a system written in Ada. This is not to put down Ada, as I feel every
language has its place. Just don't rule out the stability and reliability
of C or C++.

Steve


Jon S Anthony

unread,
Oct 30, 1997, 3:00:00 AM10/30/97
to

Alan E & Carmel J Brain <aeb...@dynamite.com.au> writes:

> C and C++ compilers differ by so much that porting is often a Nightmare.
> Before I get flamed, I'd like to talk to people who've actually ported
> code cross-platform.

That's about right. Porting anything of substance written in C even
between compilers on the _same_ platform is depressing. FOE here...

> In my own, albeit limited experience, the problems I've had with any
> C or C++ port are greater than all the problems I've had with Ada
> crossplatform put together!

That rings true as well. Typically porting Ada code between platforms
or compilers amounts to a recompilation.

/Jon

Derek A Benner

unread,
Oct 30, 1997, 3:00:00 AM10/30/97
to

Bob Horvath wrote:
>
>
> I have often wondered the same thing. I head people talk about IDEs
> and
> coming from a vi/make environment, I wonder what I am missing, if
> anything.
> Perhaps these are two different things.
>

In some ways, yes.

> It seems to me that if you know language, you don't need an IDE. And
> if you
> need an IDE, then you don't know the language.

Not true. Some IDEs are more of the wizards approach, but produce very
little in the way of real code. These do indeed form a crutch for the
programmer as they are usually present in a development environment
where the underlying toolset is still too complex (Just like MFC! <G>)

In other environments, the IDE enhances the productivity of the
programmer by merely creating the shell code for oft-repeated visual
components while allowing the programmer to concentrate on writing the
actual business rules code. (This is the approach taken by Delphi and
C++ Builder and Power++) In such languages, the initial toolset is rich
enough to provide a clean and relatively high-level interface to the
underlying OS API so that the programmer doesn't have to fight the
forest-for-the-trees syndrome that comes with, say, MFC programming.
Thus the programmer finds the IDE actually enhances productivity without
dumbing down the potential of the development language.

Derek

Alan E & Carmel J Brain

unread,
Oct 31, 1997, 3:00:00 AM10/31/97
to

Mike Copeland wrote:
>
> This has almost nothing to do with the "ease of learning" either
> language (and I feel C/C++ is much harder to do so than Pascal), but by
> some other factors:
> 1. The portability issue. C/C++ are basically portable across
> platforms, and this is an extremely important issue to corporate
> thinking.

While I agree with most of your post, I must take issue here. C and C++


are perceived as being portable. Inasmuch as there are almost no major

computers which don't have a C or C++ compiler, this is true. And that's
a big, big selling point.

However....

C and C++ compilers differ by so much that porting is often a Nightmare.
Before I get flamed, I'd like to talk to people who've actually ported

code cross-platform. In my own, albeit limited experience, the problems


I've had with any C or C++ port are greater than all the problems I've

had with Ada crossplatform put together! If you have an Ada compiler by
brand A on target X, the same code has a high probability of being
correct out-of-the-box by brand B on target X, and will often work with
brand C on target Y.

Example: 15,000 LOCs originally written on an IBM-386 using Thomson (now
Aonix) Ada-83, ported to a microVax running an Irvine compiler in
Australia for checking, then transmitted to Germany to run on a microVax
using DecAda, and finally using the Winterstein Compiler onto a KAV-30
embedded system.
3 lines of code had to be changed (in Australia). Due to bugs.
Yes, this is an actual example, of a Knowledge-based real-time
subsytem's components.

Now C++ on the other hand, written using CodeWarrior 10 on a Mac, ported
to CodeWarrior 10 on an IBM... or even MVC++ 4 vs MVC++ 5... or worse
still CodeWarrior 9 on a Mac to CodeWarrior 10 on a Mac to MVC++ 5 on an
IBM... In 15,000 LOCs of C++ how many would you reasonably expect to
have to be changed? (yes, these were actual examples too)

--
aeb...@dynamite.com.au <> <> How doth the little Crocodile
| Alan & Carmel Brain| xxxxx Improve his shining tail?
| Canberra Australia | xxxxxHxHxxxxxx _MMMMMMMMM_MMMMMMMMM
abr...@cs.adfa.oz.au o OO*O^^^^O*OO o oo oo oo oo
By pulling MAERKLIN Wagons, in 1/220 Scale

Robert S. White

unread,
Oct 31, 1997, 3:00:00 AM10/31/97
to

In article <345881C4...@horvath.com>, b...@horvath.com says...

>
>Steve Ropa wrote:
>
>> On 28 Oct 1997, Robert S. White wrote:
>>
>> > Ada's current weak points, IMHO / IME, are in "wizard smart" GUI
>> > code generation.
>>
>> Personally, I would like to see less emphasis on wizards anyway. I have
>> had too many developers tell me they knew what they were doing, but when I
>> took their wizards away, they were lost!
>
>I have often wondered the same thing. I head people talk about IDEs and
>coming from a vi/make environment, I wonder what I am missing, if anything.
>Perhaps these are two different things.
>
>It seems to me that if you know language, you don't need an IDE. And if you
>need an IDE, then you don't know the language.

Exactly! You can only occasionally use the language yet have
excellant help immediately at your fingertips (a Gates'ism I know)
and have it very easy in pointing out your errors - fixing them and
then moving on to the next error. When you use ctags with EMACS or
Rational Apex or Visual C it is very very easy to browse the source
code and quickly understand the calling requirments and who needs
what. I think I even heard of VI users hooking up ctags to browse
source :)

Of course us _REAL_ programmers don't need no stinkin' IDE :-) :-)
_____________________________________________________________________
Robert S. White -- An embedded systems software engineer
e-mail reply to reverse of: ia us lib cedar-rapids crpl shift2 whiter


Craig Franck

unread,
Oct 31, 1997, 3:00:00 AM10/31/97
to

Jon S Anthony <j...@synquiry.com> wrote:
>Alan E & Carmel J Brain <aeb...@dynamite.com.au> writes:
>
>> C and C++ compilers differ by so much that porting is often a Nightmare.
>> Before I get flamed, I'd like to talk to people who've actually ported
>> code cross-platform.
>
>That's about right. Porting anything of substance written in C even
>between compilers on the _same_ platform is depressing. FOE here...

Sounds like you may have been a victim of the run of your patients.
Well written C code is very portable. I've seen compiler upgrades
break code, but only because it was trash to begin with.

>> In my own, albeit limited experience, the problems I've had with any
>> C or C++ port are greater than all the problems I've had with Ada
>> crossplatform put together!
>

>That rings true as well. Typically porting Ada code between platforms
>or compilers amounts to a recompilation.

Something like a Windows to Mac port? How platform specific was the
code? A recompilation port would be the ideal we all chase after. If
you have such great splatfrom tools, you should feel lucky.

--
Craig
clfr...@worldnet.att.net
Manchester, NH
I try to take one day at a time, but sometimes several
days attack me at once. -- Ashleigh Brilliant


Jerry Sams

unread,
Oct 31, 1997, 3:00:00 AM10/31/97
to

In article <01bce587$2efe61a0$8691440c@worldnet>,
sas...@worldnet.att.net.DONTSPAMME says...

>
>can you guys take these idiotic flames to alt.flame...
>i am here to learn/help/etc.. and it is damn near impossible with all
>of this bickering...


This is an advocacy group, my friend.

Jerry


Timo Salmi

unread,
Oct 31, 1997, 3:00:00 AM10/31/97
to

/ADA and Pascal SUCK/j
/Yet another stupid/j
/^Newsgroups: .*,.*,.*,.*,.*,.*,.*,/h:=:j

-From: ftp://garbo.uwasa.fi/pc/pd2/tspost17.zip information file
-Subject: Re: A kill file example

[Q: How to avoid on the Usent news hostile or boring posters,
incessant bickering and net abuse.]

Consider using KILL files. Here is information that just might be of
some interest.

--------------- clip clip clipety clip clip clip ----------------
# This is an example rn kill file ~/News/rec/humor/KILL
# By prof. Timo Salmi, Mon 3-Jun-96
#
# It discards unread all postings from me in news:rec.humor
# Easy to adapt to other newsgroups or other posters!
#
# ts@ is the first part of my email address.
# The modifier h means look through the headers of the articles.
# The command j means junk.
# The command = shows the subjects of the messages being discarded.
# The : is a command separator.
#
/^From: ts@/h:=:j
#
# Or to make it more specific
# /^From: t...@uwasa.fi/h:=:j
#
# Let's not stop here, but also discard all articles that have any
# reference to me anywhere in the message. Of course this might lead
# to an overkill (eg Timothy would be a trigger). A better choice
# of keys might be necessary / useful in actual practice.
#
/timo/a:=:j
/salmi/a:=:j
#
# After you have seen that your customization works, you might wish
# to leave out the subject lister := like this
# /salmi/a:j
#
# A tip adapted from the news:news.admin.net-abuse.misc FAQ
# If you wish to kill excessively crossposted articles, use e.g.
# /^Newsgroups: .*,.*,.*,.*,.*,.*,.*,/h:=:j
# This marks as killed articles crossposted to more than 7 newsgroups.
#
# For more information on kill files plese see e.g.
# 7280 Oct 21 1995 ftp://garbo.uwasa.fi/pc/doc-net/killfile.zip
# killfile.zip rn newsreader KILL file FAQ from Leanne Phillips
#
---------------------- clip clip clip -----------------------------


Another useful system to know against abuse are the email filters.
They enable you to sort the incoming email and to avoid email you
don't want to have. If you are an elm user, try
man filter
and
which filter
to ascertain whether your system has a filter program. If it does,
put a line like this into your ~/.forward file
"| /usr/local/bin/filter -o ${HOME}/.elm/filter.errors"

Then create a ~/.elm/filter-rules file. If you wish to avoid, say,
my email, put the following line into it
if (from = "t...@uwasa.fi") then delete
or more benevolently
if (from = "listserv@") then save /your/full/path/MailFromListserv

Note that you should not put empty lines into the said files, but
you can make it more readable since comments are allowed. It you put
# (the hash) as the first character on the row, it will be deemed a
comment.

As you see my signature ends with this notification:
>Spam foiling in effect. My email filter autoresponder will return a
>required email password to users not yet in the privileges database.

I am frequently asked by the similarly spam-targeted fellow users
about my spam foiling password method (on Unix). Since I cannot
answer these questions individually, I have made the information
available via WWW. You'll find it through my home page (see my
signature) by clicking the "no-spam" thumbnail image.

All the best, Timo

....................................................................
Prof. Timo Salmi Co-moderator of news:comp.archives.msdos.announce
Moderating at ftp:// & http://garbo.uwasa.fi/ archives 193.166.120.5
Department of Accounting and Business Finance ; University of Vaasa
mailto:t...@uwasa.fi <http://www.uwasa.fi/~ts/> ; FIN-65101, Finland

Spam foiling in effect. My email filter autoresponder will return a
required email password to users not yet in the privileges database.

Ole-Hjalmar Kristensen FOU.TD/DELAB

unread,
Oct 31, 1997, 3:00:00 AM10/31/97
to

Bob Horvath <b...@horvath.com> writes:

On most platforms, exactly as big as an integer in Ada. None of those
languages guarantee the exact size of their (predefined) integers. :-)

Ole-Hj. Kristensen

Bob Horvath

unread,
Oct 31, 1997, 3:00:00 AM10/31/97
to


Ole-Hjalmar Kristensen FOU.TD/DELAB wrote:

The parenthetical and the emoticon are keys here. Only the predefined INTEGER type
in Ada is implementation dependant. You can define integer types based on ranges
and are guaranteed consistent results across compilers. This is unlike int in C
which can be of many sizes, or Java where the size of an int is defined by the
language.

I had forgotten about the implementation dependencies with the INTEGER type in Ada
because you would be a fool to use it when you can so easily create an integer type
using a range constraint.


Ole-Hjalmar Kristensen FOU.TD/DELAB

unread,
Oct 31, 1997, 3:00:00 AM10/31/97
to

Alan E & Carmel J Brain <aeb...@dynamite.com.au> writes:

> Craig Franck wrote:
> >
> > Jon S Anthony <j...@synquiry.com> wrote:
> > >Alan E & Carmel J Brain <aeb...@dynamite.com.au> writes:
> > >
> > >> C and C++ compilers differ by so much that porting is often a Nightmare.
> > >> Before I get flamed, I'd like to talk to people who've actually ported
> > >> code cross-platform.
> > >
> > >That's about right. Porting anything of substance written in C even
> > >between compilers on the _same_ platform is depressing. FOE here...
> >
> > Sounds like you may have been a victim of the run of your patients.
> > Well written C code is very portable. I've seen compiler upgrades
> > break code, but only because it was trash to begin with.
>

> May I respectfully offer a counterexample?
> Code Warrior accepts
>
> void Main()
> {
> for (int i ; i < SomeValue ; i++ )
> {
> // Do something
> }
>
> for (int i ; i < SomeOtherValue ; i++ )
> {
> // Do something else
> }
> }
>
> As by one reading of the (yet-to-be-standardised C++ spec) the scope of
> each
> i is limited to reside within the parens {} of each loop.
>
> Yet MVC++ 5 barfs: as the scope of i is deemed to be within the main
> program, so the two int i declarations clash.
>
> I do not consider the above code to be "trash". If you do, please
> elucidate as to why (heck, I could be wrong, have been before, will be
> again)

Note that he says C code, not C++.

<stuff deleted>

Dr E. Buxbaum

unread,
Oct 31, 1997, 3:00:00 AM10/31/97
to

Peter Seebach wrote:

> If
> you want to use compilers for similar languaes, and complain about the
> portability of C, we get to taunt you about every implementation that's
> ever claimed to be similar to Ada, too.

You won't have much luck there. There is an extensive validation suite
which Ada compilers have to pass. Remember, Ada is a US goverment
invention to make sure that different maschines can run the same
programs. If you have a validated Ada compiler, you can be reasonable
sure that it will compile a correct Ada program out of the box and that
the compiled program will perform the same way as on the maschine it was
written on. I personally know of only one other language for which that
is true: TeX.

Peter Seebach

unread,
Oct 31, 1997, 3:00:00 AM10/31/97
to

In article <345947D2...@horvath.com>,

Bob Horvath <b...@horvath.com> wrote:
>I have heard of an Ada to Java bytecode compiler, so now I guess you can have
>Ada everywhere!

Java only runs on a smallish number of popular desktop platforms.

>> Java is intended to produce executables and programs which are portable
>> across all implementations; this does not necessarily make it a widely
>> portable language.

>I don't understand this statement.

There are not implementations for some platforms, so, even if a program
runs on all java implementations, it may not run on all that many different
platforms.

>> Speak for C++. :) C has a bit of history, but is really fairly
>> consistent. :)

>Hmmmm. How big is an int?

Do you want storage space or range? Storage space is 'sizeof(int)',
range is [INT_MIN, INT_MAX].

C is portable in a way unlike the way Java is. Code that doesn't need
to know what size an int is can be portable among all implementations.
Code which needs a specific size of object is frequently intrinsically
not portable by nature. C wouldn't want to offer you a guaranteed, 32
bit type, because that might be horrendously inefficient on a 36-bit
machine. :)

-s
--
se...@plethora.net -- Speaking for myself. No spam please.
Copyright 1997. All rights reserved. This was not written by my cat.
C/Unix wizard - send mail for help! -- <URL:http://www.plethora.net/~seebs>
<URL:http://www.plethora.net/> - More Net, Less Spam!

Peter Seebach

unread,
Oct 31, 1997, 3:00:00 AM10/31/97
to

Yes, but will an Ada 83 compiler handle all Ada 95 programs correctly?
If not, then why is an Ada advocate complaining about C78 implementations
not agreeing with C89 implementations? (I don't normally have trouble with
Ada advocates; most of the people I meet who use Ada are quite rational.
But sometimes, you get people who blame standard C for all the failings
of pre-standard C.)

Peter Seebach

unread,
Oct 31, 1997, 3:00:00 AM10/31/97
to

In article <345AB8...@dynamite.com.au>,

Alan E & Carmel J Brain <aeb...@dynamite.com.au> wrote:
>May I respectfully offer a counterexample?

If you don't mind us making fun of you. You posted an incorrect
C++ example without including comp.lang.c++.

>Code Warrior accepts

>void Main()

Does it? Traditionally, C has used a lower case M on main, and
I seem to recall that the Mac implementations were case sensitive.
C++ likewise.

Further, if it accepts it at all, it does so out of bemused
tolerance for your misguided efforts, in both C and C++, main
is a function returning int, not void.

>{
> for (int i ; i < SomeValue ; i++ )
> {
> // Do something
> }

Well, this is certainly C++; C doesn't let you declare things in the
first expression of a for, and uses /*...*/ for comments.

> for (int i ; i < SomeOtherValue ; i++ )
> {
> // Do something else
> }
>}

>As by one reading of the (yet-to-be-standardised C++ spec) the scope of
>each
>i is limited to reside within the parens {} of each loop.

Your problem here is that C++ is random. There have been holy wars
fought among the faithful over whether i's scope should end at the
end of the loop (those aren't parens, btw, they're braces), or
should continue into the surrounding code. The "rationale" (hah!)
given by the "surrounding code" fanatics is
for (i = 0; i < 20; ++i)
if (condition)
break;
- they want to be able to see whether or not i made 20

I don't honestly know, or care, which of these C++ has officially
settled on; I know that there's been a lot of debate, and it's been
both ways.

C9X, of course, has the scope end with the end of the for; if you
want i to scope beyond the for, declare it outside the for.

>I do not consider the above code to be "trash". If you do, please
>elucidate as to why (heck, I could be wrong, have been before, will be
>again)

As C, it's trash in more ways than I can conveniently enumerate. As
C++, it's trash because:
You misspelled and misdeclared main
You depended on a not-standardized feature
This is stupid. When you are working with a pre-standardized language,
with implementations which may be tracking the standard to different
degrees, you *NEVER* push the envelope.

>The above code isn't exactly platform specific, is it? The problems with
>porting any language isolates and contains. No, it's in things like the
>STC library, where CodeWarrior 9 accepts instantiation of a vector of
>objects for which the '<' operation isn't defined, providing you never
>try sorting, whereas MVC++ 5 doesn't. But IIRC MVC++ 4 does.

Ahh. So, what you're saying is that C++ is not yet standardized, and
you can't be sure where in the process a compiler is.

Pray tell, what would you have said to someone having similar problems
with "Ada 95" compilers in 1992 or 1993?

>To recapitulate: often (not always, but more times than not) a port of
>Ada crossplatform requires only recompilation. Port from compiler to
>compiler ditto,
>but more so. I have yet to see such a thing when porting C++. I've seen
>it once in C, because we had a pre-compiler that heavily massaged the
>source code first ( a diff showed about 5% difference)

Drop by my web page; all of my non-POSIX-dependant C is expected to compile
and run correctly on all C compilers. All of them. No exceptions. I
consider any failure to do this a bug, and will happily fix it.

Yes, I really mean it.

I do know of systems that won't run the code correctly; none of them make
even a convincing claim of being C89 compilers.

>Try having a go at the lovelace Ada tutorial at http://www.adahome.com .
>You may hate it, of course. But it also may give you insights into how
>to code C and C++ better. IMHO it's worth a look for any C programmer
>anyway, just as all Ada programmers should be exposed to C { if only to
>beef up their resistance :) }

I probably will. Learning multiple natural languages makes you more
literate, fluent, and expressive in your native tongue, and I believe
the same goes for programming languages. Familiarity with other idioms
can help you see a way around a sticky problem.

Pat Rogers

unread,
Oct 31, 1997, 3:00:00 AM10/31/97
to

Peter Seebach <se...@plethora.net> wrote in article
<63d34m$ap7$1...@darla.visi.com>...

<snip>

> C is portable in a way unlike the way Java is. Code that doesn't need
> to know what size an int is can be portable among all implementations.
> Code which needs a specific size of object is frequently intrinsically
> not portable by nature.

Size yes, range no. It is a shame that one cannot specify the range of an
integer type, or the accuracy of a floating point type in C, for the sake
of portability. It is nice to have the compiler tell you that your
application requirements cannot be met, rather than not knowing unless a
(possibly obscure) bug is detected.

Scott A. Moore

unread,
Oct 31, 1997, 3:00:00 AM10/31/97
to

This subject is a complete waste of time, and completely off topic to
comp.lang.pascal.ansi-iso.
Would people who are polite please remove that newsgroup from the
reply list ?

Thanks in advance


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