Re: backup archive format saved to disk
-----BEGIN PGP SIGNED MESSAGE-----
Hash: SHA1
On 12/12/06 15:23, Mike McCarty wrote:
> [snip]
>
>> Eiffel eliminates that problem with its "expanded" classes.
>> Modula-3 avoids that problem by having data structures that are *not*
>> made of objects (in the technical OO sense) and that can be places off
>> the heap, and in other objects.
>>
>> Modula-3 even goes the whole way to low-level system programming with
>> its "unsafe" features. The difference between these and C++ or C is
>> that you can't use them by accident; you have to explicitly mark the
>> code that uses them as "unsafe".
>
> Modula-3 I'm not familiar with. There were two problems with Modula-II
> (1) it was named Modula-II instead of Pascal-II
> (2) it came along 10 years too late
>
> When C took over from Pascal, it was evident to all with eyes to see
> that it was an inferior language /as a language/ to Pascal. However,
> Pascal was also deliberately hamstrung. The language was designed for
> beginning programmers, and had so many restraints and safety nets
> that it couldn't be used for systems programming. Another issue
> is that the language definition specified p-code as the output,
> but one can leave that aside.
>
> What one cannot leave aside, for systems programming, is the places
> where strong typing could not be broken when one needed to,
> and where separate compilation was not supported.
>
> Another flaw in Pascal was that it was based on the successive
> refinement model for software development, which was a failure.
> In particular, nested procedures are a bad idea. So are local
> variables hiding global variables, but C also has that defect.
> But these features of the language can just not be used. No one
> forces you to write nested procedures.
>
> But when C came along, Pascal was just not up to systems programming.
> The only other alternative was assembler. C, bad as it is, is
> superior to assembler.
>
> Had Modula-II come along in a timely manner, and been named Pascal-II
> so people would have had a "warm fuzzy" feeling of familiarity,
> then C would, I belive, have been the backwater, and not Modula-II.
>
>> Although I find these languages wordy, I still think it a great pity
>> that C++ took off instead of them.
>
> Well, you've got my take on why that happened.
My recollection of the 1980s MS-DOS world was that Turbo Pascal's
problems were it's small memory model and lack of modules until
v4.0, by which time C had already taken over.
- --
Ron Johnson, Jr.
Jefferson LA USA
Is "common sense" really valid?
For example, it is "common sense" to white-power racists that
whites are superior to blacks, and that those with brown skins
are mud people.
However, that "common sense" is obviously wrong.
-----BEGIN PGP SIGNATURE-----
Version: GnuPG v1.4.6 (GNU/Linux)
iD8DBQFFfyWVS9HxQb37XmcRAjCPAJ9iA0nkFK4urirReGWfzllCHrxxywCfaLmb
B35h3MX6HBe0SlsOiz3IHNY=
=Muj0
-----END PGP SIGNATURE-----
Reply to: