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From: mac@cis.ksu.edu (Myron A. Calhoun)
Newsgroups: comp.lang.fortran
Subject: Re: Our favorite language
Message-ID: <1991Apr5.202916.15324@maverick.ksu.ksu.edu>
Date: 5 Apr 91 20:29:16 GMT
References: <16149@chaph.usc.edu> <1991Apr5.175526.15598@jato.jpl.nasa.gov>
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Organization: Kansas State University
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In article <16149@chaph.usc.edu>, echeverr@sal-sun8.usc.edu writes:

> Excuse me, but is it just me, or is fortran a language so old it is becoming
> obsolescent?	Really, i just can't handle doing programs while tripping over
> small details and phantom errors from nowhere and tricky compilations and
> core dump after core dump after execution...

One of my colleagues who doesn't read this group had this to say about
this thread:

>I wonder whether the language addicts can step away far enough from
>their addictions to see what they are hollering about.

>The fortran addicts are hooked on fortran because it gives them
>the freedom (and the responsibility) to do 'risky' things, i.e.
>the freedom do do (almost) anything the machine can be made to do.
>They may have to pay the price by reading crash dumps in hex ...

>The 'structured-language' addicts are addicted (not to misnamed
>'structured languages' but) to structured code, because they can build
>or buy compilers that can proofread much of that code for adherence
>to a safety dogma (thou shalt not do arithmetic on address variables;
>thou shalt not compare characters to cardinals ...).  Those addicts
>have forfeited their claims to freedom in exchange for the promised
>land of make-believe correctness ....

>Just as adherence to style guides guarantees uniformly mediocre
>(mass-produced?) 'correct prose' so use of 'structured languages'
>guarantees 'stodgy but reliable code'.  Neither style guides nor
>structured languages leave room for genius.  Because genius is scarce
>and style guides and structured languages are popular, both claim to let
>people join the select class of genius without paying the entry fee.
--Myron.
--
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