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,b87849933931bc93 X-Google-Attributes: gid109fba,public X-Google-Thread: fac41,b87849933931bc93 X-Google-Attributes: gidfac41,public X-Google-Thread: 103376,b87849933931bc93 X-Google-Attributes: gid103376,public X-Google-Thread: 114809,b87849933931bc93 X-Google-Attributes: gid114809,public X-Google-Thread: 1108a1,b87849933931bc93 X-Google-Attributes: gid1108a1,public From: kennel@lyapunov.ucsd.edu (Matt Kennel) Subject: Re: OO, C++, and something much better! Date: 1997/02/20 Message-ID: <5einvs$i0l@news1.ucsd.edu>#1/1 X-Deja-AN: 220263779 References: <5de62l$f13$1@goanna.cs.rmit.edu.au> <32FB8B51.1759@concentric.net> <3302DB3E.F70@concentric.net> <33054E63.C2A@concentric.net> <5eb5jt$kl7$1@goanna.cs.rmit.edu.au> Followup-To: comp.lang.c++,comp.lang.smalltalk,comp.lang.eiffel,comp.lang.ada,comp.object Organization: The Avant-Garde of the Now, Ltd. Newsgroups: comp.lang.c++,comp.lang.smalltalk,comp.lang.eiffel,comp.lang.ada,comp.object Date: 1997-02-20T00:00:00+00:00 List-Id: Richard A. O'Keefe (ok@goanna.cs.rmit.edu.au) wrote: : Here's the abstract of a subject at another university (so as not to : advertise): : Math XXXX: Functional Analysis : Linear metric and topological spaces, duality, weak topology, : spaces of functions, generalised derivatives and distributions, : Sobolev spaces, linear operators, compact operators, elements : of spectral theory, and operator calculus. : This use of the word "operator" : - is pretty much standard in mathematics : - refers to a *semantic* property rather than a *syntactic* one : - refers to a property that "+" does not have in any major programming : language. Thank you. I too feel the grating of my auditory cortex upon hearing descriptions of "+" as an ''operator'' in programming languages, and sigh upon sadly seeing such use enshrined in say, C++ syntax. What's wrong with "infix procedure"? (And I have a certain fondness for good old "subroutine", a clear and descriptive neologism sadly supplanted by fussy indeterminacies like 'method' 'procedure' or occasionally misleading 'function'.) Now that I'm doing quantum mechanics again, it becomes even worse, because questions like "do these operators commute or not" have entirely incommensurate connotations. I can understand how other words such as 'matrix' end up with quite unrelated meanings in medicine and mathematics, but in programming languages, the designers really should have known better. Even more irritating is the frightful abuse of the word "Vector", which quite foolishly has come to mean 'array-style containers'. \begin{james_earl_jones} ``If this is a consular ship, then *where* is the Vector Space? ... Tear this library apart until you've found the group structure, and bring me the designers, I want them alive!'' \end{james_earl_jones} : -- -- Matthew B. Kennel/Institute for Nonlinear Science, UCSD/ Where do you want to go today? ''Don't bother answering. We're abducting you.''