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From: andrew@orca.UUCP (Andrew Klossner)
Newsgroups: net.lang
Subject: Re: ANSI BASIC
Message-ID: <1397@orca.UUCP>
Date: Thu, 14-Mar-85 02:19:23 EST
Article-I.D.: orca.1397
Posted: Thu Mar 14 02:19:23 1985
Date-Received: Thu, 21-Mar-85 02:30:37 EST
References: <443@vax2.fluke.UUCP>
Organization: Tektronix, Wilsonville OR
Lines: 31

I started to prepare a point-by-point rebuttal to this article.  Then I
came to this paragraph:

	"Lets not erect yet another monument to
	whatever-feature-you-want-we'll-put-it-in.  We all know BASIC
	can never aspire to the heights of PL/1 or Algol-68.  Lets not
	forget why BASIC started simple.  Lets make a decision to
	expend our talent on a new language design which cleanly
	implements features we now consider desirable rather than
	cobbling them together with features from 1964 into an unwieldy
	mass.  Lets bite the bullet and come up with a new name for our
	new languages and stop taking BASIC's name in vain."

Oh, yeah?  Where were YOU when the call went out for people to
participate in the ANSI Basic committee?  Where were YOU when the first
public review began in 1983, and the community was implored to comment
upon the draft standard?  Where were YOU during the second public
review in 1984?  Why are you only now, when the ten-year process is
complete, coming in to complain that you don't care for the result?

We deserve the government that we get, and the person who won't go to
the polls on election day has no business griping about the government.
The same principle applies to language standards.  ANSI Basic is what
it is because of the people who cared enough to take the time and work
on it.

We recognize that ANSI Basic isn't perfect, but we're pretty damned
proud of it.  I don't think any committee could have done better.

  -- Andrew Klossner   (decvax!tektronix!orca!andrew)       [UUCP]
                       (orca!andrew.tektronix@csnet-relay)  [ARPA]