Relay-Version: version B 2.10 5/3/83; site utzoo.UUCP
Posting-Version: version B 2.10.1 6/24/83; site inset.UUCP
Path: utzoo!linus!decvax!genrad!wjh12!harvard!seismo!mcvax!ukc!qtlon!inset!dave
From: dave@inset.UUCP (Dave Lukes)
Newsgroups: net.lang.c
Subject: Re: C needs BCD (ANSI People: Please Listen)
Message-ID: <162@inset.UUCP>
Date: Wed, 31-Oct-84 13:07:13 EST
Article-I.D.: inset.162
Posted: Wed Oct 31 13:07:13 1984
Date-Received: Sat, 3-Nov-84 22:14:29 EST
References: <218@x.UUCP>
Organization: The Instruction Set Ltd, London
Lines: 78

<<<FFFLLLAAAMMMEEE   OOONNN!!!!!!>>>

_W_A_R_N_I_N_G_:
the hacker-general has determined that this flame is:
EXTREMELY _A_B_U_S_I_V_E and _S_A_R_C_A_S_T_I_C_>

PART 1:			ADDING MUCK TO C
			================

I am SICK AND TIRED of people saying:
	1)	C needs complex
	2)	C needs BCD
	3)	C needs proper strings
	4)	C needs built-in graphics handling
	5)	C needs a special 3-byte ones-complement integer type to
		handle some funny code I wrote once which won't port easily
		(nearly joke)
	6)	Etc. etc. etc.

All these things are:
	1)	Possibly true for certain uses of the language
	2)	Certainly  untrue for most uses of the language
	3)	Absolutely GARBAGE and IRRELEVANT

	Now, I live in an uncivilised and deprived continent where we can't even
spell words like colour and odour properly, and yet even I seem to have
heard of some work done at an obscure research establishment (called,
if I recall correctly, AT&T Bell Laboratories) on an enhanced version of C,
called C++.

The most interesting features of the language are:
	* user-defined types and with their own operators
	* inline functions
	* argument checking and coercion (overridable) for all functions
	* function overloading (e.g. no more fabs(f), abs(i) nonsense)
	* functions with optional trailing arguments
	* compatibility with C to roughly the same extent as the draft ANSI C
	* The C++ ``compiler'' can generate ``old C'' if required,
	  thus making re-implementation trivial.

C++ CAN do all the silly piddling little things people are always
complaining about (see [2]) ALREADY (plus a lot more).


			Re ANSI C etc.
			--------------

To Quote Robert Heinlein:
	``A committee is an animal with lots of legs and no brain''.

DISCLAIMER: One of my bosses (Mike Banahan) is on the committee,
so make what you will of this abuse.

I personally don't give a f*ck what the ANSI w*nkers do:
as far as I have been able to determine, this particular committee has
managed to do even less good than all the other committees on this
deity-forsaken mudball.

The ONLY useful thing to come out of the ANSI stuff is to make the float/double
coercion optional (WOW !! and it's ONLY taken them a YEAR).

			Re the Marriage of ANSI and ++
			------------------------------

Apparently: Stroustrup told the committee about the stuff he was doing,
and they (surprise, surprise) totally ignored it !!!

<<<FFFLLLAAAMMMEEE   OOOFFFFFF>>>

		Yours in frustration,
			Dave Lukes***.

*** Stupidity is a trade/service mark of language standardisation committees.

[1]	The C++ Programming Language - Reference Manual, Bjarne Stroustrup.
	AT&T Bell Laboratories, Computer Science Technical Report # 108.
[2]	Data Abstraction in C, Bjarne Stroustrup.
	AT&T Bell Laboratories, Computer Science Technical Report # 108.