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=0.2 required=5.0 tests=BAYES_00,INVALID_MSGID, REPLYTO_WITHOUT_TO_CC autolearn=no autolearn_force=no version=3.4.4 X-Google-Language: ENGLISH,ASCII-7-bit X-Google-Thread: fc89c,97188312486d4578 X-Google-Attributes: gidfc89c,public X-Google-Thread: 109fba,baaf5f793d03d420 X-Google-Attributes: gid109fba,public X-Google-Thread: 103376,97188312486d4578 X-Google-Attributes: gid103376,public X-Google-Thread: 1014db,6154de2e240de72a X-Google-Attributes: gid1014db,public From: Lawrence Kirby Subject: Re: What's the best language to start with? [was: Re: Should I learn C or Pascal?] Date: 1996/09/04 Message-ID: <841797763snz@genesis.demon.co.uk>#1/1 X-Deja-AN: 178331935 x-nntp-posting-host: genesis.demon.co.uk references: <01bb8df1$2e19d420$87ee6fce@timpent.airshields.com> <4vcac4$gm6@zeus.orl.mmc.com> <01bb8f19$9a89d820$32ee6fce@timhome2> x-mail2news-path: genesis.demon.co.uk organization: none reply-to: fred@genesis.demon.co.uk newsgroups: comp.lang.c,comp.lang.c++,comp.unix.programmer,comp.lang.ada Date: 1996-09-04T00:00:00+00:00 List-Id: In article <01bb8f19$9a89d820$32ee6fce@timhome2> tim@airshields.com "Tim Behrendsen" writes: >Bob Gilbert wrote in article ><4vcac4$gm6@zeus.orl.mmc.com>... ... >> A very procedural point of view. Many of the proponents of object >> oriented design might have a problem with this view, and demonstrates >> my point about allowing the details of implementation to obscure the >> higher level problem solving process. > >There is no other view than the procedural view. Some functional language programmers might take issue with that statement. Prologgers may have a thought or two also. ... >How can someone implement *any* sort in assembly language, >and "learn it but not really understand it"? To implement it, >you have to do it in great detail, and you simply can't do the >"push and prod until it works" approach to programming, which >is what I think a lot of students do. Example: once I had an assignment to implement a sort on IBM 360 assembler. What I learnt to do was convert a sequence of individual operations into assembler instructions. It didn't teach me a thing about the sort algorithm (which was merge sort). I can't imagine a worse way of teaching an algorithm than using assembly. It is essential to separate the algorithm from the implementation and assembly ties you up in knots with implementation specific details especially when you are just learning 'computing'. Once you've learnt an algorithm it makes a lot of sense to practice that algorithm by writing implementations, even in assembly, but you should understand the algorithm to a reasonable extent *before* attempting that. -- ----------------------------------------- Lawrence Kirby | fred@genesis.demon.co.uk Wilts, England | 70734.126@compuserve.com -----------------------------------------