Path: utzoo!mnetor!uunet!ncc!alberta!cdshaw
From: cdshaw@alberta.UUCP (Chris Shaw)
Newsgroups: comp.software-eng
Subject: Re: Cynic's Guide to Software Engineering, part 3
Message-ID: <1219@pembina.UUCP>
Date: 13 Apr 88 23:31:12 GMT
References: <2636@Shasta.STANFORD.EDU> <1950@rtech.UUCP>
Reply-To: cdshaw@pembina.UUCP (Chris Shaw)
Distribution: na
Organization: U. of Alberta, Edmonton, Alberta, Canada
Lines: 32

In article <1950@rtech.UUCP> daveb@rtech.UUCP  writes:
>In <2636@Shasta.STANFORD.EDU> neff@Shasta.stanford.edu (Randall Neff) writes:
>
>>	Monolingualism:  the Religion and Curse of Software Engineering
>
>Being prone to inventing contrary positions to investigate a dialectic,
>I wonder about the curse of mono-lingualism.  There seem to be few
>complaints about the use of English as the Air Traffic Control language. 
>At some point, won't language hopping make you less able to communicate
>effectively?  Does knowing a smattering of French, German, Japanese,
>Chinese, Swahili and really help you write in English?

Clearly this is a specious argument. The difference is that English is fluid 
and all computer languages are not. Computer languages must have precice
meaning, which implies that a computer language changes at its peril.
English can change in style and usage without breaking software (or crashing
planes).

On the other hand, knowing a smattering of French, German, Japanese,
Chinese, Swahili really can help you write in English, because you can borrow 
words from other languages to better encapsulate a thought. English has
succeeded so well in part because it is expressive. It is expressive in part
because words have been stolen from other languages.

>-dB
>{amdahl, cpsc6a, mtxinu, ptsfa, sun, hoptoad}!rtech!daveb daveb@rtech.uucp


-- 
Chris Shaw    cdshaw@alberta.UUCP (via watmath, ihnp4 or ubc-vision)
University of Alberta
CatchPhrase: Bogus as HELL !