Re: C++ not OOP? (Was: Language Efficiency

[Curtis Bass <cbass%intmeds1.utmb@mhost.utmb.edu>]

dweller@Starbase.NeoSoft.COM (David Weller) wrote:
>
> In article <3n5oup$g2s@atlantis.utmb.edu>,
> Curtis Bass  <cbass%intmeds1.utmb@mhost.utmb.edu> wrote:
> >dweller@Starbase.NeoSoft.COM (David Weller) wrote:
> >>
> >> In article <3n3o9c$cud@atlantis.utmb.edu>,
> >> Curtis Bass  <cbass%intmeds1.utmb@mhost.utmb.edu> wrote:
> >> >If I can write a procedure that is NOT attached to an object,
> >> >then I am NOT using a "PURE" OOPL.
> >> >
> >> Curtis, please cite the references you have used to gain this silly
> >> notion.
> >
> >[Moderate flames deleted]
> 
> Um, was it just me, or did Curtis shed more heat than light?  All I"m
> asking is for you to answer the question.  I saw Grady's comments,
> but I'd hardly consider that some kind of philosophical foundation.
> I certainly wouldn't build a house on it (or even a doghouse :-)

Had you avoided the word "silly," you would have avoided the
heat. I don't like having my intelligence questioned. You can
question my views and opinions all you want, but if you start
condescending toward my intelligence level, you'd better be
wearing asbestos.

We are not discussing a "philosophical foundation," but simply
the difference(s) between "pure" and "hybrid" OOPL's. As I said
in my previous post, I was just answering another poster's
question re: why C++ is not "pure" in the OOP sense. You
obviously have a problem with this, and there is obviously
nothing I can do about it.

> Perhaps a better way to formulate it is: How do you defend syntactic
> differences as somehow rendering something more "pure" than another?

Listen, "pure" does NOT necessarily mean "good" or "holy" or
"righteous." Saying that C++ is not a "pure" OOPL is NOT
saying that C++ is "sinful" or "evil." No, pure (in this
context) simply means homogeneous, and "impure" simple means
heterogeneous, and this is WRT the programming model(s).
C++ DIRECTLY supports TWO models; Structured and Object-
Oriented, ergo, it is heterogenous, ergo, it is not purely
an OOPL. Smalltalk directly supports ONLY ONE paradigm:
Object-Oriented programming, ergo, it is homogeneous, ergo,
it is purely an OOPL. What I cannot fathom is why this
offends people, as if I am committing some sort of religious
heresy by saying these things.

Yes, yes, YES. I KNOW that you can "do procedural programming"
in Smalltalk. Who cares? Smalltalk STILL only supports the
Object-Oriented model directly. If you want to do procedural
programming, you should NOT use Smalltalk -- other languages
are better suited. If you INSIST on doing procdural programming
in Smalltalk, you can do it, but only by fighting the language
and not by working with the language. You have to attach your
procedures to an object -- there is no way around this. As Booch
says, "everything is an object" in Smalltalk -- there are no
procedures, only methods. You CAN do structured programming in
old-fashioned BASIC, but there are other languages that are
better suited. You can do spaghetti programming in Pascal,
but there are other languages that are better suited. All this
rambling means is this: Doing "procedural" programming in a
"pure" OOPL does NOT invalidate the definition of "pure," nor
does it make the distinction between "pure" and "hybrid" invalid.

If you had bothered to read my previous post, I admitted that
the distinction between "pure" and "hybrid" OOPL's may or may
not have any value to a person, and that I couldn't care less
one way or the other.

So, basically, there is nothing to "defend."


				Curtis Bass
				Software Systems Specialist II
				University of Texas Medical Branch