* Re: Excerpts from "The C Programming Language" (Re: C bashing)
[not found] <2426@psuhcx.psu.edu>
@ 1990-05-24 20:58 ` bagpiper
1990-05-25 15:10 ` David Kassover
0 siblings, 1 reply; 2+ messages in thread
From: bagpiper @ 1990-05-24 20:58 UTC (permalink / raw)
I basically agree with Mr. Hannum...I just want to correct his misconception
that you can't do cast-like operations in Ada....you just can't do them
very efficiently!! (no flames please, many Ada implementation don't handle
generics very well...)
In article <2426@psuhcx.psu.edu>, hannum@schubert.psu.edu (Charles Hannum) writes:
> To settle some of the flame wars from Ada, Lisp, and Pascal lovers against the
> C language, I quote some paragraphs from the introduction to "The C Programming
> Language" by Brian W. Kernighan and Dennis M. Ritchie below:
>
[stuff deleted]
> of incompatible data types. Nevertheless, C retains the basic philosophy that
> programmers know what they are doing; it only requires that they state their
> intentions explicitly."
>
> Pay careful attention to that last sentence. This is the basic philosophical
> difference between C and [Ada,Pascal,...]. C allows you to do funny type cast-
> ing, as long as you state it explicitly. [Ada,Pascal,...] does not. In the
> hands of an idiot, this is dangerous. In the hands on an experienced and
> knowledgable programmer, this is a powerful tool.
You can do cast like operations in Ada. Check out the predefined generic
UNCHECKED_CONVERSION. There are also a few other places where Ada seems
to have lower level features then c. Some of the representation attributes
are hard to copy in c. Of course the other day I was trying to write
a minimal debugger in Ada and just about killed myself for some way to
represent a generic pointer (void *). Oh well....
[more stuff deleted]
> Virtually,
> - Charles Martin Hannum II PennMUD Design Team - (Resident) Programmer
> (That's Charles to you!) "Those who say a thing cannot be done should
> Please send mail to: under no circumstances stand in the way of
> hannum@haydn.psu.edu he who is doing it." - a misquote
Later,
Michael
P.S. I am no receiving comp.lang.ada yet (I'm working on it), so if someone
in comp.lang.ada has something to say, please mail it.
-------------------------------------------------------------------------------
+ Michael Hunter {backbone}!hacgate!trwind!mcosm!bagpiper +
+ BIX:bagpiper +
+ NOTHING like a spacecraft with a bad attitude!!! +
-------------------------------------------------------------------------------
^ permalink raw reply [flat|nested] 2+ messages in thread
* Re: Excerpts from "The C Programming Language" (Re: C bashing)
1990-05-24 20:58 ` Excerpts from "The C Programming Language" (Re: C bashing) bagpiper
@ 1990-05-25 15:10 ` David Kassover
0 siblings, 0 replies; 2+ messages in thread
From: David Kassover @ 1990-05-25 15:10 UTC (permalink / raw)
>In article <2426@psuhcx.psu.edu>, hannum@schubert.psu.edu (Charles Hannum) writes:
|| To settle some of the flame wars from Ada, Lisp, and Pascal lovers against the
|| C language, I quote some paragraphs from the introduction to "The C Programming
|| Language" by Brian W. Kernighan and Dennis M. Ritchie below:
||
|[stuff deleted]
|| of incompatible data types. Nevertheless, C retains the basic philosophy that
|| programmers know what they are doing; it only requires that they state their
|| intentions explicitly."
Well and good. But the *users* don't know what the programmer
was doing.
For that matter, the programmer doesn't know what the current
implementation or port is doing to the program (or the user) 8-)
I would think that if someone wanted to build a sharp tool, one
would also want to keep the edges away from the handles. IMO,
Ada helps this more than C does.
--
David Kassover "Proper technique helps protect you against
kassover@ra.crd.ge.com sharp weapons and dull judges."
kassover@crd.ge.com F. Collins
^ permalink raw reply [flat|nested] 2+ messages in thread
end of thread, other threads:[~1990-05-25 15:10 UTC | newest]
Thread overview: 2+ messages (download: mbox.gz / follow: Atom feed)
-- links below jump to the message on this page --
[not found] <2426@psuhcx.psu.edu>
1990-05-24 20:58 ` Excerpts from "The C Programming Language" (Re: C bashing) bagpiper
1990-05-25 15:10 ` David Kassover
This is a public inbox, see mirroring instructions
for how to clone and mirror all data and code used for this inbox