Relay-Version: version B 2.10 5/3/83; site utzoo.UUCP
Path: utzoo!mnetor!seismo!ut-sally!husc6!harvard!ksr!alcatraz!benson
From: benson@alcatraz.ksr.com (Benson Margulies)
Newsgroups: comp.unix.questions,comp.edu,comp.lang.misc
Subject: Re: Teaching Assembler on VAX (BSD 4.3)
Message-ID: <140@ksr.UUCP>
Date: Wed, 20-May-87 08:04:14 EDT
Article-I.D.: ksr.140
Posted: Wed May 20 08:04:14 1987
Date-Received: Sat, 23-May-87 06:01:49 EDT
References: <351@aucs.UUCP> <588@maccs.UUCP> <234@brandx.rutgers.edu>
Sender: nobody@ksr.UUCP
Reply-To: benson@ksr.UUCP (Benson Margulies)
Organization: Kendall Square Research, Cambridge MA
Lines: 38
Xref: mnetor comp.unix.questions:2428 comp.edu:396 comp.lang.misc:406

In article <201@drilex.UUCP> dricej@drilex.UUCP (Craig Jackson) writes:
>The original poster bemoaned the Unix assembler for teaching assembler.
>Many followups said that it was fine for those few things one puts in
>assembler, especially if you add m4.
>
>The answer there is *yes*.  If I wanted a course in assembler, and got taught
>'as', I would be somewhat lost if my job then required me to know the likes
>of ASMH.  There are a number of capabilities that one expects from most 
>assemblers; 'as' has relatively few of them.  (The local labels are nice,
>I hadn't known about them.)
>

If you went to a school that taught you concepts and approaches
instead of cookbooks, you would be prepared for anything your job
threw at you, from microcode to Prolog.

Caveat Student: those who live by the `current technical relevance'
die the same way.

PS: The Unix-centrism of some of the posts around here is pretty
amusing. "Most of the code should be in C, of course."

Only if you have the misfortune to be marooned there. It never ceases
to amaze me that people haven't noticed that C was the right thing for
a PDP-11 and is the wrong thing for almost bigger, faster, or more
sophisticated. On a *real computer*, with a real optimizing compiler,
you *can* have datatypes and performance at the same time.

C programmers have replaced the assembly language programmers of the
60s and 70s, who could always be heard asserting that you couldn't
write a *real* system in anything else without it being far to slow.

Those who condemn PL/I are doomed to face ADA.


Benson I. Margulies                         Kendall Square Research Corp.
harvard!ksr!benson			    All comments the responsibility
ksr!benson@harvard.harvard.edu		    of the author, if anyone.