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=-1.9 required=5.0 tests=BAYES_00 autolearn=ham autolearn_force=no version=3.4.4 X-Google-Language: ENGLISH,ASCII-7-bit X-Google-Thread: 103376,198c6302c4a0b0d7 X-Google-Attributes: gid103376,public X-Google-ArrivalTime: 2001-12-18 11:40:32 PST Path: archiver1.google.com!news1.google.com!newsfeed.stanford.edu!news-spur1.maxwell.syr.edu!news.maxwell.syr.edu!newsfeed.media.kyoto-u.ac.jp!sjc-peer.news.verio.net!news.verio.net!sea-read.news.verio.net.POSTED!not-for-mail Newsgroups: comp.lang.ada From: Brian Rogoff Subject: Re: Ada / C++ comparison paper In-Reply-To: Message-ID: References: <3c1dc786@pull.gecm.com> <1008601517.470745@edh3> <1008626816.690418@master.nyc.kbcfp.com> <1008690461.380980@master.nyc.kbcfp.com> MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: TEXT/PLAIN; charset=US-ASCII Date: Tue, 18 Dec 2001 19:40:29 GMT NNTP-Posting-Host: 192.220.65.223 X-Complaints-To: abuse@verio.net X-Trace: sea-read.news.verio.net 1008704429 192.220.65.223 (Tue, 18 Dec 2001 19:40:29 GMT) NNTP-Posting-Date: Tue, 18 Dec 2001 19:40:29 GMT Organization: Verio Xref: archiver1.google.com comp.lang.ada:18063 Date: 2001-12-18T19:40:29+00:00 List-Id: On Tue, 18 Dec 2001, Pat Rogers wrote: > "Hyman Rosen" wrote in message > > David C. Hoos wrote (in an e-mail to me): > > > The paper claims that code reuse is the critical benefit of OOP. > > This is nonsense, implying, among other things, that OOP has > > an "eat your spinach" flavor - that it's use in a project is primarily > > for the purpose of aiding future projects. I would suggest that > > OOP's critical benefit is run-time polymorphism. > > IMHO, the critical benefit of OOP is the supported separation of code that > will change from code that need not. Run-time polymorphism is the means to > that end, not the end itself. You can get this separation with a sufficiently powerful module system, and even Ada (95) has one. This is one of the primary benefits of using signatures in Ada. No OOP involved. I kind of agree with Hyman here. "Kind of", because I think that OO is really overrated and that given a choice between an OO language, like, say Eiffel or Java, and a powerful enough non-OO language, like SML, or OCaml without the O, I'd much prefer to work in the latter class :-) of language. OO is mostly a good way to make a confusing mess with open recursion, though I have found it convenient at times, and the convenience comes from the run time dispatching, not so much from the incremental programming aspects. In any case, I think Hyman is a bit oversensitive to some of the ignorant C++ bashing in this n.g. I don't think of C++ as being "a great step backwards" as some people here have said, and I have made the point many times that I think some amount of inference/automatic instantiation, like what C++ has, would be a great thing in an Ada like language. I'd also be happy with a bit more shorthand, like +:=, and a more distinct array accessing syntax (like []), etc. Still, its an Ada newsgroup, and I wonder how many times Hyman has complained about anti-Ada ignorance in the C++ world... -- Brian