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From: dewar@cs.nyu.edu (Robert Dewar)
Subject: Re: What's the best language to start with? [was: Re: Should I learn
 C or Pasca
Date: 1996/08/06
Message-ID: <dewar.839351193@schonberg>#1/1
X-Deja-AN: 172531469
references: <4ttdlg$2pr@news.ida.org> <4u7hl7$amo@newsbf02.news.aol.com>
organization: Courant Institute of Mathematical Sciences
newsgroups: comp.lang.c,comp.lang.c++,comp.unix.programmer,comp.lang.ada
Date: 1996-08-06T00:00:00+00:00
List-Id: <comp.lang.ada>


Steve said

">When you're using C or C++, you really need to know how the
>underlying assembly language works. Why? Because pointer arithmetic
>makes little sense if you don't, and tracking down rogue pointers
>overwriting your local stack values and other nasties is impossible if
>you don't understand how underlying machines work.
  Absolutely correct. This is essential to get across to the student at
the
beginning of their study of C++.

Steve Heller"



That would *really* be an indictment of C++ as a teaching language if it
were true, but it is not true in fact. Many people teach C++ using various
approaches without finding the need to talk about low level models. One
approach is to use a set of reasonabley high level classes, e.g. for
checked arrays, and completely avoid the pointer issue.