Path: utzoo!mnetor!uunet!lll-winken!lll-tis!ames!nrl-cmf!cmcl2!brl-adm!adm!christiansen@chewi.che.wisc.EDU
From: christiansen@chewi.che.wisc.EDU (REED CHRISTIANSEN)
Newsgroups: comp.lang.c
Subject: C != FORTH; Pointers == Links
Message-ID: <12103@brl-adm.ARPA>
Date: 3 Mar 88 14:51:39 GMT
Sender: news@brl-adm.ARPA
Lines: 51

In article <8803021809.aa16276@SMOKE.BRL.ARPA>,
TLIMONCE%DREW.BITNET@CUNYVM.CUNY.EDU (Tom Limoncelli) writes:

>I'm really excited about the idea of a "D" programming language. Let me
>make a suggest or two:
>
>I think that the one thing that really detracts from C is the fact that it
>isn't RPN.  Reverse-polish-notation has a lot of benefits.  First of all,

   Oh, no.  I like RPN on my calculator, because it is fast, but no one
   else has to read my calculator code.  Please don't turn a readable
   language into something like "FORTH"...  Maintenance programmers
   will turn your name into an ugly epithet!

>we'd get the support of all the HP calculator lovers, all the FORTH users,
>and compiler writers would find it easier to write compilers since RPN is
>easier to parse.

   Parsing isn't really a big issue.  Most computer science undergraduates
   learn how to parse normal mathematical notation.  And think of the
   conversion problems from C, Pascal or Fortran...

>
>Another thing that "D" should have... actually not have, is pointers. At
>least 85% of the problems discussed here on Info-C are people who have
>some problem with confusion about pointers.  Removing pointers would solve
>this whole set of problems.

   Remove my pointers?!  The ability to dynamically manage memory and
   manipulate arbitrary data structures is the main reason I will use
   C on an application rather than Fortran.  Of course, for numerical
   algorithms, Fortran is my choice, due to C's inadequate array support.

>Instead of pointers, we should have dynamic links.  These would be just
>like pointers but totally different.  Dynamic links will hold the address
>of what they are pointing to.  With such a simple definition like this,
>nobody will get confused.

   What is a pointer, except for an address of an object, and its
   associated type?  Removing the type specification thwarts prototype
   checking, which is contrary to the spirit of the ANSI standard.

Exasperatedly,                   | Small Song
                                 | ===== ====
Reed L. Christiansen             | The reeds
UW Dept of Chemical Engineering  | give way to the
1415 Johnson Drive               |
Madison, WI  53706               | wind and give
(608)262-7267                    | the wind away  -- A.R.Ammons, 1970

Internet: CHRISTIANSEN@CHEWI.CHE.WISC.EDU
------