Relay-Version: version B 2.10 5/3/83; site utzoo.UUCP Path: utzoo!utgpu!water!watmath!clyde!rutgers!sunybcs!ugfailau From: ugfailau@sunybcs.UUCP Newsgroups: comp.lang.c,comp.sys.ibm.pc Subject: Re: What's Wrong here? Message-ID: <6996@sunybcs.UUCP> Date: Fri, 4-Dec-87 02:02:18 EST Article-I.D.: sunybcs.6996 Posted: Fri Dec 4 02:02:18 1987 Date-Received: Sun, 6-Dec-87 21:59:32 EST References: <278@westmark.UUCP> <6755@brl-smoke.ARPA> <6855@sunybcs.UUCP> <6949@sunybcs.UUCP> <1958@frog.UUCP> Sender: nobody@sunybcs.UUCP Reply-To: ugfailau@joey.UUCP (Fai Lau) Organization: SUNY/Buffalo Computer Science Lines: 80 Xref: utgpu comp.lang.c:5407 comp.sys.ibm.pc:9213 It is getting ridiculous. I will make my absolute last post regarding this incident. I apologize for my last outburst. As I said it was very inappropriate to post flame the way I did in this news group, especially in such bad faith. This is, after all, not the Insult Board of my school, which I once took much pleasures in and from which I have retired. I was very angry with Doug's name-calling post so I though that that would be a pretty good excuse to try my skill, or whatever's left of it. Again, I think my post was excessive. So in order to be fair, I'll swallow John Woods' more juvenile portion of his post without any rebuttal. And I don't want to see another thing regarding this incident again. I wish I could move this article to soc.insult and truly indulge myself at John Woods' expense, but then such news group doesn't exist. So I'll have to settle, and so will everybody. In article <1958@frog.UUCP> john@frog.UUCP (John Woods, Software) writes: > >I find this truly amazing. One of the most professional fonts of wisdom >on comp.lang.c (namely Doug) is being flamed by some idiot who clearly doesn't >understand anything more complicated than how to boot his PC. > >In short, it IS NOT defined, your opinion is worthless, and evidently >you weren't interested in understanding what you were talking about, >either. (What "system point of view"?) Try shutting up until you do. > System point of view means to consider the behavior of a software (or particular, a language) as a subset of the system. There are many definitions regarding how many softwares ought to behavior in an ideal environment, on paper, in theory, according to formulas. But in the real world we have to implement such ideals in an un-ideal machines, and used by 'imperfect' humans. As a result there are things ending up being different from the deffinitions and the theories. For example, Lisp. The concept of Lisp looks like it's the best thing ever happened to AI research (at least when it first came out), and we certainly admired its potentials at one time. Lisp is widely used today. And you know what happens? It's just another programming language. We recurse like a bat out of hell, and then find out what a pain on the butt it could be keeping track of those lists within lists. And we start using setqs, iteration whenever it's more convenient. Just how much spirit is left? Are the original wine and roses evident in our codes? Another example. When Modula-1 first came out, it was supposed to be a very structured language which would replace Pascal, and which would provide good low level access. It incorporated data abstraction, the idea of modules, better scope and extend controls, etc.. and the result should be something less error prone and more complete. But so what? Have Do you seen Turbo Modula-2? I've tried Modula-2 on mainframe. What looks good on paper doesn't necessary work well in the real world. So what am I getting at? Strict language definition looks good in a text book. And it would be nice to be followed precisely in the developing of theories. But in the real world you cannot separate the language from the machine it is being implemented in. Granted portability may suffer if a programmer went beyond what's in the book in his command of a language, but if the circumstances allow it should not be forbidden, or even discouraged. And of course it is frequently done. Personally I don't like doing things by the books. And I believe certain definitions of a language is most useful when it is defined under the circumstances where *you* use it. >Wise words. Remember them yourself, or get ready to be spanked by everyone >on USENET who knows what they're talking about. That's fewer than it should >be, but more than you would want. > See I swallowed it! Fai Lau SUNY at Buffalo (The Arctic Wonderland) UUCP: ..{mit-ems|watmath|rocksanne}!sunybcs!ugfailau BI: ugfailau@sunybcs