From: Richard D Riehle <laoXhai@ix.netcom.com>
Subject: Re: Ada OO Mechanism
Date: 1999/05/21
Date: 1999-05-20T19:19:42-05:00 [thread overview]
Message-ID: <7i28qu$1bc@dfw-ixnews11.ix.netcom.com> (raw)
In-Reply-To: dale-2105990836310001@r1021c-18.ppp.cs.rmit.edu.au
In article <dale-2105990836310001@r1021c-18.ppp.cs.rmit.edu.au>,
dale@cs.rmit.edu.au (Dale Stanbrough) wrote:
>" I would like to ask a question, however. In a recent thread
> entitled "A question for my personal knowledge" some people were saying
> that the Ada OO mechanism was counterintuitive. I tend to agree. This
> concern was dismissed by others as being merely "syntactic sugar", and
> claims were made that the Ada mechanism is actually easier to use than
> the C++ style."
>
>I actually like the method.operation notation, but I don't find the lack
>of it in Ada a really big problem. It _is_ syntactic sugar, in as much as
>there are no semantic differences that can be attributed to it.
I know some languages in which the verb is the last word of a sentence.
Some other languages are subject-verb-object, others have entirely
different syntax. So when I hear someone say that Ada is
counterintuitive or C++ is counterintuitive or Object COBOL is
counterintuitive, I understand that they mean, "This is not the way
I am used to thinking about things." That does not mean it is
counterintuitive. It simply means they have had difficulty learning
a new programming language just as they might have trouble learning a
new spoken language. When I hear someone speak of "natural" language,
I have to wonder what they are talking about.
There is absolutely nothing wrong with the syntax of C++. Nothing
wrong or counterintuitive about the syntax of Ada or Eiffel. And
there is nothing counterintuitive about the object model of the
emerging COBOL standard. If you want to say, "I am having trouble
learning this language because it is not what I am used to," fine.
That is accepting responsibility for your own difficulty. Lots of
great ideas throughout history have been counterintuitive. The
Greeks could not conceive of a symbol for zero. Aristotle thought
it was intutitive to begin counting from two because there was no
point in counting if there only a single instance. Before the
invention of calculus, the notion of a limit was counterintuitive.
The statement, "I find such and such to be counterintuitive," is a
tired old excuse for failing to work hard enough to understand some
idea. It does not apply to languages; especially not to programming
languages.
Richard Riehle
richard@adaworks.com
http://www.adaworks.com
next prev parent reply other threads:[~1999-05-21 0:00 UTC|newest]
Thread overview: 116+ messages / expand[flat|nested] mbox.gz Atom feed top
1999-05-20 0:00 Ada OO Mechanism Shawn M. Root
1999-05-20 0:00 ` Samuel Mize
1999-05-20 0:00 ` David Botton
1999-05-20 0:00 ` Samuel Mize
1999-05-20 0:00 ` David Botton
1999-05-24 0:00 ` Hyman Rosen
1999-05-24 0:00 ` Robert Dewar
1999-05-24 0:00 ` Hyman Rosen
1999-05-24 0:00 ` David Starner
1999-05-24 0:00 ` bob
1999-05-24 0:00 ` David Starner
1999-05-25 0:00 ` Ole-Hjalmar Kristensen
1999-05-25 0:00 ` Florian Weimer
1999-05-25 0:00 ` Mark A Biggar
1999-05-25 0:00 ` Hyman Rosen
1999-05-25 0:00 ` Richard D Riehle
1999-05-25 0:00 ` David Botton
1999-05-26 0:00 ` Tom Moran
1999-05-27 0:00 ` Aidan Skinner
1999-05-25 0:00 ` Samuel Mize
1999-05-25 0:00 ` Hyman Rosen
1999-05-25 0:00 ` Richard D Riehle
1999-05-25 0:00 ` Hyman Rosen
1999-05-26 0:00 ` Ray Blaak
1999-05-26 0:00 ` Hyman Rosen
1999-05-26 0:00 ` Richard D Riehle
1999-05-26 0:00 ` Hyman Rosen
1999-05-27 0:00 ` Richard D Riehle
1999-06-05 0:00 ` Matthew Heaney
1999-06-07 0:00 ` Hyman Rosen
1999-05-28 0:00 ` Laurent Guerby
1999-06-05 0:00 ` Matthew Heaney
1999-06-07 0:00 ` Hyman Rosen
1999-06-08 0:00 ` Robert Dewar
1999-06-08 0:00 ` Markus Kuhn
1999-06-08 0:00 ` Stanley R. Allen
1999-06-08 0:00 ` Stanley R. Allen
1999-06-08 0:00 ` Matthew Heaney
1999-06-08 0:00 ` Hyman Rosen
1999-06-08 0:00 ` Samuel Mize
1999-06-08 0:00 ` Hyman Rosen
[not found] ` <t7zp2sr6yf.fsf@calumny.jyacc.c <t7r9nmz8ou.fsf@calumny.jyacc.com>
1999-06-08 0:00 ` Larry Kilgallen
1999-06-08 0:00 ` Hyman Rosen
1999-06-14 0:00 ` Robert A Duff
[not found] ` <t7zp2sr6yf.fsf@calumny.jyacc.c <t7emjmmx8w.fsf@calumny.jyacc.com>
1999-06-08 0:00 ` Larry Kilgallen
1999-06-08 0:00 ` Hyman Rosen
1999-06-08 0:00 ` Tucker Taft
1999-06-08 0:00 ` Brian Rogoff
1999-06-09 0:00 ` Tucker Taft
1999-06-09 0:00 ` Robert Dewar
[not found] ` < <375E92CB.27850620@averstar.com>
1999-06-09 0:00 ` Brian Rogoff
1999-06-14 0:00 ` Robert A Duff
1999-06-09 0:00 ` Samuel Mize
1999-06-09 0:00 ` Matthew Heaney
[not found] ` <t7zp2sr6yf.fsf@calumny.jyacc.c <375d9a3d.e1cccc63@averstar.com>
1999-06-09 0:00 ` Larry Kilgallen
1999-06-09 0:00 ` Tucker Taft
1999-05-25 0:00 ` Brian Rogoff
1999-05-25 0:00 ` Jim
1999-05-26 0:00 ` Robert Dewar
1999-05-26 0:00 ` Brian Rogoff
1999-05-25 0:00 ` Samuel Mize
1999-05-25 0:00 ` Chris
1999-05-25 0:00 ` David Botton
1999-05-27 0:00 ` Aidan Skinner
1999-05-27 0:00 ` Gautier
1999-05-27 0:00 ` Samuel Mize
1999-05-27 0:00 ` Samuel Mize
1999-05-27 0:00 ` Jon S Anthony
1999-05-27 0:00 ` Samuel Mize
1999-05-27 0:00 ` Hyman Rosen
1999-05-28 0:00 ` Laurent Guerby
1999-05-28 0:00 ` Richard D Riehle
1999-05-28 0:00 ` Tom Moran
1999-05-28 0:00 ` Samuel Mize
1999-05-28 0:00 ` Robert I. Eachus
1999-05-28 0:00 ` Brian Rogoff
1999-05-29 0:00 ` Ehud Lamm
1999-05-30 0:00 ` chris
1999-05-30 0:00 ` Robert Dewar
1999-05-30 0:00 ` Harry George
1999-05-30 0:00 ` Vladimir Olensky
1999-05-31 0:00 ` Robert Dewar
1999-05-31 0:00 ` Vladimir Olensky
1999-06-03 0:00 ` Dale Stanbrough
1999-06-02 0:00 ` mike
1999-06-03 0:00 ` Robert Dewar
1999-06-06 0:00 ` David Botton
1999-06-07 0:00 ` Robert Dewar
1999-06-01 0:00 ` Richard D Riehle
1999-06-03 0:00 ` Matthew Heaney
1999-06-03 0:00 ` Matthew Heaney
1999-05-24 0:00 ` Mike
1999-05-25 0:00 ` Robert Dewar
1999-05-25 0:00 ` Samuel Mize
1999-05-25 0:00 ` Hyman Rosen
1999-05-25 0:00 ` David Starner
1999-05-26 0:00 ` Laurent Guerby
1999-05-26 0:00 ` Hyman Rosen
1999-05-28 0:00 ` Laurent Guerby
1999-06-01 0:00 ` Hyman Rosen
1999-06-03 0:00 ` Fraser Wilson
1999-05-26 0:00 ` Ole-Hjalmar Kristensen
1999-06-03 0:00 ` Matthew Heaney
1999-06-03 0:00 ` Hyman Rosen
1999-05-21 0:00 ` Dale Stanbrough
1999-05-20 0:00 ` bob
1999-05-21 0:00 ` Dale Stanbrough
1999-05-21 0:00 ` Richard D Riehle [this message]
1999-05-21 0:00 ` Marin David Condic
1999-05-21 0:00 ` Steve
1999-05-21 0:00 ` Dan Nagle
1999-05-24 0:00 ` Marin David Condic
1999-05-21 0:00 ` Shawn M. Root
1999-05-21 0:00 ` Richard D Riehle
1999-05-25 0:00 ` Shawn M. Root
1999-05-25 0:00 ` Don Overheu
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