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From: Robb.Nebbe@di.epfl.ch (Robb Nebbe)
Newsgroups: comp.lang.ada,comp.lang.c++,comp.object
Subject: Re: Is C/C++ the future?
Date: 1 Nov 1994 11:29:40 GMT
Organization: Ecole Polytechnique Federale de Lausanne
Sender: nebbe@lglsun3.epfl.ch (Robb Nebbe)
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References: <1994Oct25.234705.26530@sei.cmu.edu> <85DF1879046@annwfn.com>
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Xref: nntp.gmd.de comp.lang.ada:16365 comp.lang.c++:76838 comp.object:16885
Date: 1994-11-01T11:29:40+00:00
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In article <85DF1879046@annwfn.com>, merlin@annwfn.com (Fred McCall) writes:
|> 
|> Doesn't this problem (not being able to write 'real' programs, according
|> to the respondent, without requiring all that machine-specific support)
|> pretty much shoot the much-vaunted 'portability' of Ada code in the
|> foot?  It seems to me that this leaves Ada with the same problem that so
|> many Ada advocates want to 'bash' C/C++ for -- non-portable code is
|> non-portable (somewhat solipsist, but that seems to be the complaint).
|> 

Obviously things that are outside the langauge are not portable.
Hopefully things that are defined in the language are defined 
with enough precision that they are portable or at least the
limits of their portability are well defined. Futhermore, one
would hope that what is portable is sufficiently complete and
that compilers are available on a sufficient number of different
platforms.

Some languages are more portable than others for a variety of
reasons; many of these reasons are directly related to the
language but some go beyond the language. If anyone was naive
enough to pretend that Ada is more portable than C/C++ then
you must either infer what kind of portability they are talking
about or dismiss it as a blanket statement that language
enthousiast are prone to make.

If you doubt that the definition of Ada is more precise and
the limits to portability better defined as well as better
verified than C/C++ (which is a bit unfair since C++ isn't as
close to standardization as the new revision of Ada) then
you should make your case since this is usually what people
mean when they talk about portability as it relates to a
langauge. 

If you want to talk about other kinds of portability then
that would be fine also since they are certainly pertinent.

- Robb Nebbe