Relay-Version: version B 2.10 5/3/83; site utzoo.UUCP Path: utzoo!mnetor!uunet!seismo!ut-sally!husc6!mit-eddie!ll-xn!ames!oliveb!pyramid!fmsrl7!grazier From: grazier@fmsrl7.UUCP (Kevin Grazier) Newsgroups: comp.lang.c Subject: Re: goto's in C: an opinion... Message-ID: <960@fmsrl7.UUCP> Date: Fri, 24-Jul-87 13:27:57 EDT Article-I.D.: fmsrl7.960 Posted: Fri Jul 24 13:27:57 1987 Date-Received: Sat, 25-Jul-87 15:18:03 EDT References: <3289@bigburd.PRC.Unisys.COM> <7571@beta.UUCP> <765@haddock.ISC.COM> Reply-To: grazier@fmsrl7.UUCP (Kevin Grazier) Organization: Ford Motor Company, Scientific Research Labs, Dearborn, MI Lines: 39 Keywords: C, goto, style In article <7571@beta.UUCP> hwe@beta.UUCP (Skip Egdorf) writes: >In any language that supports a complete set of structured constructs, >there is NO NEED for a goto, and the statement should be removed from >the language! For what it's worth, I don't entirely agree. Take, for instance, code which is time-critical (control systems software, for example). Now, add nested switch statements. When the code is executed at the "lowest level" of the switch, it's so much more practical to jump to the end of the swithces instead of executing the break break break.......ad infinitum sequence. When you're running real-time code which is running something like an engine, you look for speed ANYWHERE. This is another case in which practicality diverges slightly from the theoretical. On a more intangible level, I seem to remember being taught as an undergrad that there are still a COUPLE (and I mean just that) algorithms that can't be done without a goto. Unfortunately, I can't remember what they did, though. If this receives too many flames, maybe I'll have to look it up. What the instructor was trying to show by this example, though, was that there are, indeed, only a COUPLE algorithms which cannot be done without gotos and that since we weren't doing anything near as complex, we shouldn't use them (actually couldn't use would be more proper because if you used one, you flunked the assignment). -- Kevin R. Grazier Have you driven a Ford, lately? Ford Motor Company Scientific Research Labs Advanced Powertrain Systems & Controls Engineering uucp: {philabs | pyramid} !fmsrl7!grazier OR grazier@fmsrl7.UUCP VOICE: (313) 739-8586