Relay-Version: version B 2.10 5/3/83; site utzoo.UUCP Path: utzoo!mnetor!uunet!seismo!sundc!pitstop!sun!amdcad!ames!hao!oddjob!gargoyle!ihnp4!cbosgd!clyde!watmath!mks!wheels From: wheels@mks.UUCP (Gerry Wheeler) Newsgroups: comp.sys.amiga,comp.lang.misc,comp.sys.mac,comp.sys.atari.st,comp.sys.ibm.pc,comp.sys.apollo,comp.sys.m68k Subject: Re: SNOBOL for Amy Message-ID: <324@mks.UUCP> Date: Fri, 27-Nov-87 15:05:39 EST Article-I.D.: mks.324 Posted: Fri Nov 27 15:05:39 1987 Date-Received: Mon, 30-Nov-87 02:38:57 EST References: <18476@amdahl.amdahl.com> <2034@ulowell.cs.ulowell.edu> <18763@amdahl.amdahl.com> Organization: Mortice Kern Systems, Waterloo, Ont. Lines: 35 Keywords: SNOBOL languages Catspaw Icon Awk Summary: How do SNOBOL and Icon compare to Awk? Xref: mnetor comp.sys.amiga:11667 comp.lang.misc:916 comp.sys.mac:10380 comp.sys.atari.st:6522 comp.sys.ibm.pc:10577 comp.sys.apollo:566 comp.sys.m68k:668 [This discussion has been cross-posted to about a million newsgroups. I was going to edit some out, but there may be people out there following the conversation, so I left it.] In article <18763@amdahl.amdahl.com>, kim@amdahl.amdahl.com (Kim DeVaughn) writes: > In article <2034@ulowell.cs.ulowell.edu>, page@ulowell.cs.ulowell.edu (Bob Page) writes: > > kim@amdahl.amdahl.com (Kim DeVaughn) wrote: > > >[Catspaw, Inc porting their MS-DOS SNOBOL to the Amiga] > > >I thought I'd let all of you who are interested in text and string > > >processing know that such an animal is on the way. > > > > How does it compare with ICON, available on a Fish Disk? > > I'm not really sure ... haven't tried Icon out yet. All I know about Icon > is from a July 1986 article in "Computer Language" magazine, and what I've > attached below. How do SNOBOL and Icon compare to Awk? I did use SNOBOL for a class in programming, but that was several years ago and I've forgotten it. I haven't used Icon at all. For those who don't know Awk, is was written by Aho, Weinberger and Kernighan (hence its name). The basic outline of a program is a sequence of pattern/action pairs. As the data file is read, each pattern (regular expression) is compared to the current line, and the action is executed if there is a match. The action parts bear a strong resemblance to C, not surprisingly. As I recall SNOBOL, it was very easy to end up with spaghetti code. Awk seems to be fairly easy to read. Mr's A., W., and K. have just published a book about the latest version of Awk, for those who are interested. -- Gerry Wheeler Phone: (519)884-2251 Mortice Kern Systems Inc. UUCP: uunet!watmath!mks!wheels 43 Bridgeport Rd. E. BIX: mks Waterloo, Ontario N2J 2J4 CompuServe: 73260,1043