Relay-Version: version B 2.10 5/3/83; site utzoo.UUCP Posting-Version: version B 2.10 5/3/83; site utzoo.UUCP Path: utzoo!henry From: henry@utzoo.UUCP (Henry Spencer) Newsgroups: net.lang.c Subject: Re: Pascals Origins Message-ID: <6915@utzoo.UUCP> Date: Wed, 9-Jul-86 17:57:57 EDT Article-I.D.: utzoo.6915 Posted: Wed Jul 9 17:57:57 1986 Date-Received: Wed, 9-Jul-86 17:57:57 EDT References: <2007@brl-smoke.ARPA> Organization: U of Toronto Zoology Lines: 32 > > ... Wirth designed Pascal as a teaching... > Wrong! Even Wirth denied that. Curious, he said quite explicitly in his early Pascal papers that it was designed primarily as a teaching language. > ...no provisions for > separate compilation. Everything in one source file, and they make > people write large scale projects in it? Pure insanity. Wirth definitely had his head screwed on wrong when he did that. The idea behind it was that a fast compiler could recompile stuff more quickly than a linkage editor could link it in, so why bother with the extra type-checking hassles? The compilers he was thinking of were the early Pascal compilers, which were simple and fast; the linkage editor he was thinking of was the OS/360 one, a notorious pig. In more recent times he has come to his senses. Many of Root-Boy's other complaints about Pascal can be covered with a single observation: Pascal is over 15 years old. It's not surprising that it has a lot of problems by modern standards. > (Root Boy) Jim Cottrell > You should all JUMP UP AND DOWN for TWO HOURS while I decide on a NEW CAREER!! Jim, if you're really gonna pick a new career, something that will take you away from your keyboard forever, and jumping up and down for two hours will help, a lot of people will do it! -- Usenet(n): AT&T scheme to earn revenue from otherwise-unused Henry Spencer @ U of Toronto Zoology late-night phone capacity. {allegra,ihnp4,decvax,pyramid}!utzoo!henry