Path: utzoo!attcan!uunet!fernwood!decwrl!wuarchive!zaphod.mps.ohio-state.edu!swrinde!ucsd!hub.ucsb.edu!eiffel!bertrand
From: bertrand@eiffel.UUCP (Bertrand Meyer)
Newsgroups: comp.lang.eiffel
Subject: Re: Assertions and deferred routines
Message-ID: <423@eiffel.UUCP>
Date: 20 Oct 90 05:29:59 GMT
References: <443@kepler1.kepler.com> <420@eiffel.UUCP> <445@kepler1.kepler.com>
Organization: Interactive Software Engineering, Santa Barbara CA
Lines: 93

From <445@kepler1.kepler.com> by fcaggian@kepler.com (Frank Caggiano):

> Thanks to all for clearing up this problem.  I was lead astray
> by [various incomplete or ambiguous statements in
> ``Object-Oriented Software Construction''].

Thanks for this precise list. It will certainly be put to good
use for the second edition (if and when...).

> To both of my last postings I was told that what I was
> asking had been mentioned in a previous posting. (Dr. Meyer refered
> me back to a posting in January of this year)
> [...]
> As we only received
> Eiffel in May of this year I wasn't reading the group back in Jan.

	By mentioning previous postings I certainly did not intend
to dismiss the questions raised by Mr. Caggiano or to give the
impression that they were irrelevant. It is perfectly natural that
certain questions should recur as new users join the discussion.
The sequence of events may then be the following: someone raises
a question that has already been discussed (although perhaps in
somewhat different terms); someone else (me in the case under
review) responds with a message giving the references to the earlier
discussion, and summarizing their main points. This gives both an
immediate answer, and a pointer to more exhaustive articles.
This seems to be the right way to work.

> 	I offer these comments as one who has become hooked on
> Object Oriented programing in general and Eiffel in particular and
> would hate to see ISE shoot itself in the foot.
> [...] 
> Does ISE have an archive of this group that is available?

Now here is an opportunity to shoot myself in the remaining foot.
The answer is (sorry) that the question was dealt with
in a previous posting. There is an archive, courtesy of
Digital Equipment's Western Research Lab, and thanks to the
efforts of Roger H. Goun. Quoting from his message
<14686@shlump.nac.dec.com> of August 18, 1990:

|| I'm pleased to announce that an archive of the comp.lang.eiffel
|| newsgroup is now available on gatekeeper.dec.com.

|| The files are in /pub/plan/eiffel/usenet/USENET-xx-yyy, where `xx'
|| represents the last two digits of the year and `yyy' the month of
|| posting. Compressed versions of the files are also available.
|| 
|| From IP (either inside DEC or outside DEC):
||     anonymous FTP to gatekeeper.dec.com (16.1.0.2)
||     cd pub/plan/eiffel/usenet
||     get USENET-xx-yyy (or to get the compressed copy, bin, get
|| USENET-xx-yyy.Z)
|| 
|| From a UUCP neighbor of decwrl: 
||     "uucp decwrl!~/pub/plan/eiffel/usenet/USENET-xx-yyy.Z"
|| 
|| From the DEC Easynet:
||     DECWRL::"/pub/plan/eiffel/usenet/USENET-xx-yyy"  

(The rest of Mr. Goun's message contained size measurements,
a mention of five apparently missing articles, and acknowledgments.
His mail address is goun@ddif.enet.dec.com.)

> As a customer of ISE I 
> expect to be informed of these issues directly.

	That is a fair expectation. There have not been any
issues of the Eiffel newsletter (Champ-de-Mars) recently and I
apologize for that. The newsletter is being revived.

	On the other hand the newsgroup is a very convenient way of
sharing information with users. Even with a newsletter, or
some other medium, it is still easy for someone (newcomer or not)
to miss a previously published answer. And the newsletter
does not allow one to correct the situation by posting a public
request.

> How many other
> products have been lost to human-kind through the centuries because
> the implementation did not live up to the idea and the customers
> got tired of waiting . I mean do we really want our grandchildren 
> programming in C++*2 :-) .

I absolutely agree. The C++ customers will someday get tired of
waiting. Actually there was a posting on this theme recently in the
C++ newsgroup on precisely this theme (I have no remaining foot
to shoot, but for the record the reference is <752@ubbpc.UUCP>,
by William G. Hutchison of Unisys): ``Waiting for
Godot'' to bring exceptions, genericity and other minor amenities.
As for our grandchildren, only the paleontology professors
among them will know what C++ was.

-- Bertrand Meyer
bertrand@eiffel.com