From mboxrd@z Thu Jan 1 00:00:00 1970 X-Spam-Checker-Version: SpamAssassin 3.4.4 (2020-01-24) on polar.synack.me X-Spam-Level: X-Spam-Status: No, score=-1.3 required=5.0 tests=BAYES_00,INVALID_MSGID autolearn=no autolearn_force=no version=3.4.4 X-Google-Language: ENGLISH,ASCII-7-bit X-Google-Thread: 109fba,1042f393323e22da X-Google-Attributes: gid109fba,public X-Google-Thread: 1014db,1042f393323e22da X-Google-Attributes: gid1014db,public X-Google-Thread: 103376,1042f393323e22da X-Google-Attributes: gid103376,public From: Suzette Norby Subject: Re: Any research putting c above ada? Date: 1997/04/24 Message-ID: <335F9D0E.41C67EA6@cacd.rockwell.com>#1/1 X-Deja-AN: 237316671 References: <5ih6i9$oct$1@waldorf.csc.calpoly.edu> <5j078b$b25$1@NNTP.MsState.Edu> <5j31lj$qnk@huron.eel.ufl.edu> Organization: Rockwell Collins Newsgroups: comp.lang.c++,comp.lang.c,comp.lang.ada Date: 1997-04-24T00:00:00+00:00 List-Id: Daniel P Hudson wrote: > > Peter Amey wrote: > >On 15 Apr 1997, Tom White wrote: > > >> I remember a Turing Award Lecture by C.A.R. Hoare from the early > >> eighties (dig through some Journals of the ACM). Hoare was not > >> an Ada booster; he was concerned about the complexity of Ada from > >> both the application programmer's and compiler implementor's > >> perspectives. > > [SNIP] > > >A quote from this 1980 lecture includes the following: > > [SNIP] > > Jeez, he had to go back 17 years to find something wrong with Ada. > You know what 17 years does to a language? That's 2 years before > the ANSI X3J11 sub-commitee for C was even formed. We could kill the > C that was used back then. But who cares what the problems with Ada > or C were back then, they are long gone by now. > > Perhaps you would like to suffer through a list of problems with > C from 1980 bit I wouldn't. Why don't you try keeping the > factual criticisms within at least this decade if not the past > couple of years. It was also 3 years before the _first_ Ada standard. Since we're strolling down memory lane, let's go back a few more years. The following, explaining why C was not even considered as a candidate to be the common language, is quoted from "Ada - The Project, The DoD High Order Language Working Group", copyright 1993, which was originally published in ACM SIGPLAN Notices (Vol. 28, No. 3, March 1993).** ** Permission to copy without fee all or part of this material is granted provided that the copies are not made or distributed for direct commercial advantage, this ACM copyright notice and the title of the publication and its date appear, and notice is given that copying is by permission of the Association for Computing Machinery. To copy otherwise, or to republish, requires a fee. (Complete text available at "http://sw-eng.falls-church.va.us/AdaIC/pol-hist/history/holwg-93/2.htm". The following is found on the second "page".) "Evaluations The next step, beginning in June 1976, was the evaluation of existing languages against the integrated set of requirements. ... Other languages were considered for formal evaluation, but were not included because preliminary examination led one to believe that they would not meet the requirements so were not viable candidates for the purposes of the DoD. One such language was C. ... When Bell Labs were invited to evaluate C against the DoD requirements, they said that there was no chance of C meeting the requirements of readability, safety, etc., for which we were striving, and that it should not even be on the list of evaluated languages. We recognized the truth in their observation and honored their request." C then? Not even close. In whose opinion? Bell Labs' opinion! To get back to the present, there is a comparison (by David A. Wheeler) of today's versions of "Ada, C, C++, and Java vs. The Steelman" requirements at "http://www.adahome.com/History/Steelman/steeltab.htm". It includes the following table (see article for caveats and link to Steelman): Language "No" "Partial" "Mostly" "Yes" Percentage of Answers with "Mostly" or "Yes" Ada 3 5 11 94 93% C 32 21 1 44 53% C++ 19 17 23 54 68% Java 20 12 22 59 72% C now? Still not close. C++? 68% might pass, but it won't get you on the Dean's List. -- Suzette N. \\\ \\\ \\\ \\\ \\\ \\\ \\\ \\\ \\\ ( :) ( :) ( :) ( :) ( :) ( :) ( :) ( :) ( :) /// /// /// /// /// /// /// /// /// (Speaking only for myself)