Xref: utzoo comp.lang.fortran:748 comp.lang.c:10692 Path: utzoo!utgpu!water!watmath!clyde!att!osu-cis!tut.cis.ohio-state.edu!mailrus!ames!nrl-cmf!cmcl2!brl-adm!brl-smoke!gwyn From: gwyn@brl-smoke.ARPA (Doug Gwyn ) Newsgroups: comp.lang.fortran,comp.lang.c Subject: Re: Should I convert FORTRAN code to C? Message-ID: <8047@brl-smoke.ARPA> Date: 9 Jun 88 00:55:18 GMT References: <10655@agate.BERKELEY.EDU> <1857@hubcap.UUCP> <10681@agate.BERKELEY.EDU> Reply-To: gwyn@brl.arpa (Doug Gwyn (VLD/VMB)) Organization: Ballistic Research Lab (BRL), APG, MD. Lines: 25 The original poster was wondering if he should convert Fortran code to C. My answer to that is, not if you can get an adequate Fortran compiler for your system. If you think it would be useful, there is at least one automatic Fortran-to-C translator commercially available (Fortrix). If you plan to thoroughly revise your application (so that it amounts to a rewrite), you would be better off designing the replacement from scratch, and it might make sense to implement the replacement in C if you're not going to be dependent on EISPACK, IMSL, etc. Fortran's single biggest problem is that it has shitty support for data structures. If this doesn't bother you, then by all means continue to use Fortran. I think by now everyone who is likely to learn better techniques would have done so. It happens that many of our more interesting applications are primarily written in C, because Fortran is just too puny. And we do run them on our Crays as well as on small and medium sized systems. I find that with sufficient care, useful C code can be even more portable than Fortran, more efficient, and more maintainable. Of course with insufficient care, horrible code can be produced in ANY language. Use whatever tool seems right for the job and that you are comfortable using.