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From: jav8106@ritvax.isc.rit.edu (Doctor FORTRAN)
Newsgroups: comp.lang.fortran
Subject: Re: Fortran vs. C argument
Message-ID: <1990Dec5.214940.9901@isc.rit.edu>
Date: 5 Dec 90 21:19:16 GMT
References: <28621@usc>
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In article <28621@usc>, ajayshah@almaak.usc.edu (Ajay Shah) writes an open
invitation for a Flame War:

[senseless prattle deleted]

%(show me a bright kid leaving college today who's actually 
%enthusiastic about Fortran).

There are many, many bright kids leaving college today who are actually and
genuinely enthusiastic about FORTRAN. Surprise, surprise!! The reason why they
are is that they see FORTRAN as quite simply the only game in town. C is fine
for computer science, where FORTRAN is weak. But, for physical, mathematical,
and life sciences, C's advantages over FORTRAN are of little or no importance.
What advantage does C offer the typical scientist or engineer? Not much.

%Like Cobol and the 8088, there are sound commercial reasons why
%Fortran is important, and why it's going to take a while to fade 
%away.  To paraphrase Einstein, when people who're in Graduate
%school today are in their 40s and 50s, there will be very little
%Fortran in the world.  Because top-notch people in the professional
%world today got their Ph. D.s in the middle ages, they'll
%definitely use Fortran.  Why bother arguing about it??

The comparison of FORTRAN to COBOL and the 8088 microprocessor, along with the
rest of Ajay's remarks, are beneath the dignity of a rational reply. Instead,
I proffer the epithet deemed appropriate for such tirades:


               /\
              /  \  /\      /\  /\    Flame Off, Buddy!!!!!
              |   \/  \    /  \/  \
              |        \  /        \
               \        \/  /\  /\  |
                |    /\    /  \/  | |
                \   /  \   |      / |
                 \  \   |   \    / /
                  \  \  /    \  / /
           ______________________________________
          /                                     /\
         |       --------________    ------    ||||
        |                                      ||||
        |              -------_______          ||||
        |   -------                            ||||
         \______________________________________\/


It's obvious that you're trying to make many people here angry with your
insulting remarks. If you want to fight, get off the net and join the Army.

I should probably say that so long as there are bit-jockeys around who want to
futz around with structures and unions, and who are under the mistaken
impression that everybody who programs a computer should actually _care,_ we
will have folks like Ajay trying to tell us how to do our science. Now, where I
come from, we have a name for folks who like to tell others how to do their
business, and that's "Busybody." (Actually, there is _another_ name, but I
wouldn't want to include it in the network traffic.)

C ==========================================================================

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