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Xref: utzoo comp.lang.ada:2996 comp.lang.c++:5652
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From: psrc@pegasus.ATT.COM (Paul S. R. Chisholm)
Newsgroups: comp.lang.ada,comp.lang.c++
Subject: Re: Ada vs. C++
Summary: what's coming up or there (exceptions, generics, concurrency)
Message-ID: <4271@pegasus.ATT.COM>
Date: 26 Nov 89 06:09:08 GMT
References: <21248@uflorida.cis.ufl.EDU> <7115@hubcap.clemson.edu>
Organization: AT&T Bell Laboratories
List-Id: <comp.lang.ada>

>From pff@beach.cis.ufl.edu (Pablo Fernicola):
> In IEEE Software, Vol.5 Num. 3 page 26, we read
> 	"C++ has several advantages over Ada: ..."

In article <7115@hubcap.clemson.edu>,
billwolf%hazel.cs.clemson.edu@hubcap.clemson.edu
(William Thomas Wolfe, 2847) writes:
>    But unfortunately seems to be missing fundamental features
>    such as exceptions, generics, and concurrency...

Exceptions:  Dr. Stroustrup just made a proposal for doing exceptions
in C++.  It looks pretty good.

Generics:  Dr. Stroustrup made a proposal sometime last year on
parametarized types.  His exception handling paper uses the same
syntax, so presumably he's reasonably comfortable with it.

Concurrency:  Most of the time, C++ programs (and programmers) should
use the facilities of the target platform.  Dr. Stroustrup has provided
support for "tasks" in both "C with classes" and C++; the AT&T C++
Language System comes with a Task class.  That's as close to standard
as C++ comes these days.  No, there's no direct support in the language
(special syntax, etc.) for supporting concurrency, for the same reason
there's no direct support for I/O:  it's better done in a library.

To summarize, C++ has the same support for exceptions and generics that
Ada has for inheritance.  (The Ada preprocessor you mention is a red
herring for DOD contractors, unless you propose they submit the
*output* of the preprocessor.)

>    Bill Wolfe, wtwolfe@hubcap.clemson.edu

Paul S. R. Chisholm, AT&T Bell Laboratories
att!pegasus!psrc, psrc@pegasus.att.com, AT&T Mail !psrchisholm
I'm not speaking for the company, I'm just speaking my mind.