Path: utzoo!utgpu!water!watmath!clyde!att!osu-cis!tut.cis.ohio-state.edu!mailrus!cornell!uw-beaver!teknowledge-vaxc!sri-unix!quintus!ok From: ok@quintus.uucp (Richard A. O'Keefe) Newsgroups: comp.lang.fortran Subject: Re: Fortran vs C for computations Message-ID: <465@quintus.UUCP> Date: 23 Sep 88 01:36:26 GMT References: <459@quintus.UUCP> <3962@lanl.gov> Sender: news@quintus.UUCP Reply-To: ok@quintus.UUCP (Richard A. O'Keefe) Organization: Quintus Computer Systems, Inc. Lines: 29 In article <3962@lanl.gov> jlg@lanl.gov (Jim Giles) writes: >From article <459@quintus.UUCP>, by ok@quintus.uucp (Richard A. O'Keefe): >> it is NOT possible to apply cpp usefully to "a" standard Fortran >> program which already exists (which I have been denying). > >I have several standard Fortran programs which already exist to which >cpp can be usefully applied. What you are trying to claim is that is is >possible to find a standard conforming Fortran program (presumably more >than one) which causes cpp to generate bad results. No one has ever >denied that. That's not what I was TRYING to claim, it is precisely what I DID claim. The claim that "cpp can be applied to A Fortran program" is normally to be understood as meaning "to every Fortran program", which I denied. Giles' original claim was that preprocessing capabilities were not needed as part of a Fortran standard because it is a text editing task which can be done by a wide range of tools, specifically including cpp. My claim is that many, perhaps even most, Fortran programs not written with cpp (or a very similar tool) in mind cannot usefully be used with cpp. Obviously, there is at least one program where it will work: END If you want to preprocess COBOL, you're better off if your preprocessor understands COBOL lexical structure, and produces output which respects COBOL's layout requirements. If you want to preprocess FORTRAN, you're better off if your preprocessor understands FORTRAN lexical structure, and produces output which respects FORTRAN's layout requirements. cpp applied to Fortran is like a dog walking on its hind legs.