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From: John Hobson <jhobson@ceco.ceco.com>
Subject: Re: What's the best language to learn? [was Re: Should I learn C or
 Pascal?]
Date: 1996/08/19
Message-ID: <3218CAD9.167EB0E7@ceco.ceco.com>#1/1
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Tim Behrendsen wrote:
> 
> John Hobson <jhobson@ceco.ceco.com> wrote in article
> <32187C76.41C67EA6@ceco.ceco.com>...
> > Tim Behrendsen wrote:

> > In *The Mythical Man-Month*, Fredrick Brooks says that the best gauge
> > of programmer productivity is lines of code written per <time period>.
> > Since assembler takes so many more lines to do something than (say) C
> > does, it at least appears harder because it takes longer.
> 
> I think Brooks' point is to measure relative programmer
> productivity in the same language, not different languages.  What
> is it the average programmer produces; like, 100 lines/month
> of fully debugged code or some low number?  Obviously, it's
> not the amount of typing that influences productivity.

Actually, Brooks says specifically that it is a measure of programmer
productivity IRREGARDLESS of language.  One of his points is
that this is an argument in favour of HLLs.

> I don't think anyone is advocating a return to assembly for
> "real world" large-project purposes, only for educational
> purposes.  I'll add you to the list of people who found it
> to be of value early on.  :-)

Yes, you can put me down as one of the people who is in favour of
learning assembler.  You can also put me down as one who is grateful
that he does not actually have to program in it.

-- 
John Hobson             |Whenever someone says to me,
Unix Support Group      |"Have a nice day", I reply,
ComEd, Chicago, IL, USA |"Sorry, I've made other plans."
jhobson@ceco.ceco.com   |	-- Sir Peter Ustinov