Re: Any research putting c above ada?

[jsa@alexandria (Jon S Anthony)]

In article <5jqvbj$bd9@mtinsc05.worldnet.att.net> Craig Franck <clfranck@worldnet.att.net> writes:

> Suzette Norby <psnorby@cacd.rockwell.com> wrote:
> 
> >Project, The DoD High Order Language Working Group", copyright 1993, 
> >which was originally published in ACM SIGPLAN Notices (Vol. 28, No. 
> >3, March 1993).**
> >
> >     ** Permission to copy without fee all or part of this material 
> >        is granted provided that the copies are not made or 
> >        distributed for direct commercial advantage, this ACM 
> >        copyright notice and the title of the publication and its 
> >        date appear, and notice is given that copying is by 
> >        permission of the Association for Computing Machinery. To 
> >        copy otherwise, or to republish, requires a fee.
...
> >"Evaluations 
> >
> >The next step, beginning in June 1976, was the evaluation of 
> >existing languages against the integrated set of requirements. 
> >     
> >...
> >Other languages were considered for formal evaluation, but were not 
> >included because preliminary examination led one to believe that 
> >they would not meet the requirements so were not viable candidates 
> >for the purposes of the DoD. One such language was C. ... When Bell 
> >Labs were invited to evaluate C against the DoD requirements, they 
> >said that there was no chance of C meeting the requirements of 
> >readability, safety, etc., for which we were striving, and that it 
> >should not even be on the list of evaluated languages. We 
> >recognized the truth in their observation and honored their 
> >request."
> >     
> >C then? Not even close.  In whose opinion?  Bell Labs' opinion!
> 
> Yes, but they were the DOD's own requirements for a language 
> *not* Bell Labs requirements on what constitutes an acceptable 
> programming language to use on certain projects.

Well, you rather miss the mark on this particular comment as at least
two of the requirements in question ("readability, safety,") are not
exactly specific to DoD.  Or do you think Bell Labs (or ATT) doesn't
really care about either issue?  Actually, for all I know, maybe they
don't and your comment is in fact spot on.

/Jon

-- 
Jon Anthony
Organon Motives, Inc.
Belmont, MA 02178
617.484.3383
jsa@organon.com