Path: utzoo!attcan!uunet!munnari.oz.au!bruce!trlluna!rhea.trl.oz.au!aduncan
From: aduncan@rhea.trl.oz.au (Allan Duncan)
Newsgroups: comp.sys.amiga
Subject: Re: C Routines
Message-ID: <1858@trlluna.trl.oz>
Date: 3 Jul 90 01:57:52 GMT
References: <138087@sun.Eng.Sun.COM>
Sender: root@trlluna.trl.oz
Lines: 32

From article <138087@sun.Eng.Sun.COM>, by cmcmanis@stpeter.Eng.Sun.COM (Chuck McManis):
> In article <27155@cc.usu.edu> SLMT9@cc.usu.edu writes:
>> ... After going through the Fish Disks I got a lot of good C routines. 
>> ... I will put them all together and them In an organized way. ...
> 
> Joshua, this should be an educational exercise for you and I encourage

[ much valid comment deleted ]

> A trip to the library should turn up one or two and the local university
> bookstore might have a couple more. This is one of the secrets of 
> "quick" programming, ie understanding a bunch of algorithms that you
> produce in any language on demand, but do not be tricked into depending
> on a canned algorithm that you do not fully understand to get you 
> through. Too many times talented people become "cookbook" coders
> who take little bits of code from their stock pots and glue them
> together to make a program. Those programs are never as reliable
> and efficient as they could be...

This is not entirely true, in Fortran there are a number of carefully
crafted libraries of routines that are used by those who need to do a
particular bit of number crunching, know what algorithm is needed, but
don't have the time to spend on re-inventing the bug-free code (and bugs
can be hard to detect in end conditions).

I have also seen a book/disk set for both C and Fortran routines (IBM
format, but all you need is a bridgeboard).

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