Path: utzoo!utgpu!news-server.csri.toronto.edu!rpi!usc!elroy.jpl.nasa.gov!jato!vsnyder
From: vsnyder@jato.jpl.nasa.gov (Van Snyder)
Newsgroups: comp.lang.fortran
Subject: Re: Carriage control characters
Message-ID: <1991Apr19.174224.285@jato.jpl.nasa.gov>
Date: 19 Apr 91 17:42:24 GMT
References: <280c1ad4@ThreeL.co.uk> <141240.2451@timbuk.cray.com>
Reply-To: vsnyder@jato.Jpl.Nasa.Gov (Van Snyder)
Organization: Jet Propulsion Laboratory, Pasadena, CA
Lines: 44

In article <141240.2451@timbuk.cray.com> wws@raphael.cray.com (Walter Spector) writes:
>In article <280c1ad4@ThreeL.co.uk>, jf@threel.co.uk (John Fisher) writes:
>|> trevor@ccc.govt.nz writes:
>|> 
>|> > Direct cursor addressing isn't standard Fortran. (Fortran carriage-controls for
>|> > printers IS standard, but we have one printer that doesn't recognise them...)
>|> 
>|> Well, sort of.  What the standard says is that carriage control charcters
>|> are recognised when you are *printing*.  And it defines *printing* to mean
>|> "The transfer of information in a formatted record to certain devices
>|> determined by the processor".
>
>Does anyone see the need to have carraige control maintained in
>the Fortran Standard?  There *is* a seperate ANSI Standard for
>Carraige Control which has existed for years - far more detailed
>than what is in the Fortran Standard.  The notion of carraige control
>is hopelessly outdated these days.
>
>What do netters think?  Should the F90 committee have removed carraige
>control from the Standard?  Is this something they should do 'the next
>time around'?
>
>Walt
>
>-- 
>Walt Spector
>(wws@renaissance.cray.com)                       "Parity is for farmers"
>Sunnyvale, California                                    - Seymour Cray
>_._ _._ _.... _. ._.

One of the reasons for what most perceive as "warts" in fortran 90 is
compatibility to fortran 77.  The need for compatibility won't go away:
there's just too much software that uses each feature of fortran 77.
After 10-15 years, there will be too much software that uses each new
feature of fortran 90 to dream of removing any feature, or spelling it
differently (unless somebody makes a PD translator that re-writes fortran
77 and fortran 90 features in fortran '03).  So carriage control is
probably here to stay, and any mistakes the committee made in formulating
fortran 90 are also here to stay.

-- 
vsnyder@jato.Jpl.Nasa.Gov
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vsnyder@jato.uucp