Path: utzoo!attcan!uunet!tut.cis.ohio-state.edu!ucbvax!bloom-beacon!eru!hagbard!sunic!dkuug!iesd!iesd.auc.dk!fischer From: fischer@iesd.auc.dk (Lars P. Fischer) Newsgroups: comp.lang.c++ Subject: Re: Learning C++ Message-ID: Date: 6 Feb 91 14:41:20 GMT References: <1108@tesla.njit.edu> <29911@mimsy.umd.edu> Sender: news@iesd.auc.dk (UseNet News) Organization: Mathematics and Computer Science, University of Aalborg Lines: 22 In-reply-to: davew@tove.cs.umd.edu's message of 5 Feb 91 20:21:21 GMT >>>>> On 5 Feb 91 20:21:21, davew@tove.cs.umd.edu (David G. Wonnacott) said: David> 2) While the C language is a subset of the C++ language, good C David> style is not a subset of good C++ style. Much of the David> difficulty in teaching C programmers to program well in C++ David> lies in trying to get them to let go of some of the techniques David> they use all the time in C (I know this from experience -- I David> spent several years teaching C++ to C programmers). To paraphrase Dijkstra: The trouble with learning C is all the things you then have to painfully unlearn. If I was to teach an introductory course, I would much prefer C++. If you stick to the basics, C++ is easier to understand and more well structured than C. With C++ you would learn to do do abstract data types *right*, with language support. In general, you rarely, if ever, have to resort to "wizard tricks" in C++. /Lars -- Lars Fischer, fischer@iesd.auc.dk | Beauty is a French phonetic corruption CS Dept., Univ. of Aalborg, DENMARK. | - FZ