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=-1.9 required=5.0 tests=BAYES_00,FREEMAIL_FROM autolearn=ham autolearn_force=no version=3.4.4 X-Google-Language: ENGLISH,ASCII-7-bit X-Google-Thread: 103376,54889de51045a215 X-Google-Attributes: gid103376,public X-Google-ArrivalTime: 2003-10-19 22:52:33 PST Path: archiver1.google.com!news2.google.com!news.maxwell.syr.edu!logbridge.uoregon.edu!nntp-server.caltech.edu!attla2!ip.att.net!attbi_feed3!attbi.com!rwcrnsc53.POSTED!not-for-mail Message-ID: <3F937806.9080205@comcast.net> From: "Robert I. Eachus" User-Agent: Mozilla/5.0 (Windows; U; Windows NT 5.0; en-US; rv:1.0.2) Gecko/20021120 Netscape/7.01 X-Accept-Language: en-us, en MIME-Version: 1.0 Newsgroups: comp.lang.ada Subject: Re: += in ada References: <1066224357.499523@master.nyc.kbcfp.com> <1066231159.711433@master.nyc.kbcfp.com> <1066311805.222491@master.nyc.kbcfp.com> <3F8F3077.60402@comcast.net> <3F900F35.50203@comcast.net> <3F92B607.809@comcast.net> Content-Type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii; format=flowed Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit NNTP-Posting-Host: 24.34.139.183 X-Complaints-To: abuse@comcast.net X-Trace: rwcrnsc53 1066629153 24.34.139.183 (Mon, 20 Oct 2003 05:52:33 GMT) NNTP-Posting-Date: Mon, 20 Oct 2003 05:52:33 GMT Organization: Comcast Online Date: Mon, 20 Oct 2003 05:52:33 GMT Xref: archiver1.google.com comp.lang.ada:1173 Date: 2003-10-20T05:52:33+00:00 List-Id: I had about decided to let this topic die a graceful death when Chad R. Meiners wrote: > People that use Ada are people that feel safety and maintenance are > important characteristics of a programming language. I felt this is worth repeating, if only as a epitaph to this topic. This is what Russ kept not understanding. Add clarity and readability and a lot of what we used to call the -ilities, and that is the debate in a nutshell. Chad even gave a perfect riposte, to the question of side effects. The statement x += y += 1; is perfectly legal C, and I'll let Russ choose what is the effect, and what is the side effect. But back to the -ilities. They are the core of what Ada is meant to be. No particular -ilitiy, such as maintainability or reliability is given primacy of purpose. All are important. And no one who understands Ada is willing to give up a piece of any of the -ilities to save keystrokes. Something that improves readability at a slight cost in maintainability? Let me think about it, a lot. The same for a change that went the other way. But something that gives up a little bit of each of the -ilities to make the code generator's job easier? Or to save keystrokes? Forget it. -- Robert I. Eachus "Quality is the Buddha. Quality is scientific reality. Quality is the goal of Art. It remains to work these concepts into a practical, down-to-earth context, and for this there is nothing more practical or down-to-earth than what I have been talking about all along...the repair of an old motorcycle." -- from Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance by Robert Pirsig