Path: utzoo!mnetor!uunet!husc6!bloom-beacon!tut.cis.ohio-state.edu!osu-cis!att!ihnp4!ihlpf!nevin1 From: nevin1@ihlpf.ATT.COM (00704a-Liber) Newsgroups: comp.lang.misc Subject: Re: Language illiteracy Message-ID: <4653@ihlpf.ATT.COM> Date: 5 May 88 18:57:54 GMT References: <787@trwcsed.trwrb.UUCP> Reply-To: nevin1@ihlpf.UUCP (00704a-Liber,N.J.) Organization: AT&T Bell Laboratories - Naperville, Illinois Lines: 33 In article <787@trwcsed.trwrb.UUCP> arenberg@trwcsed.UUCP (Jeff Arenberg) writes: >There are a lot of good computer languages available (C, Fortran, Pascal, >Algol and many more) and anyone who is serious about programming should be >able to work in any of them. Regretably, most engineers, moreover most >of the people writing any kind of software, are not serious programmers. Algol is readily available?? :-) I feel that there is a distinction between able to write code in a given language and *programming* in a given language. For example: when a Pascal programmer first learns C, he/she tends to write C code that looks like Pascal (some even go to the extreme of doing #define BEGIN {, etc.). Each different language has a paradigm that goes with it, and in order to be a good *programmer* (vs. coder) in a given language one must also use the paradigm. Unfortunately, it is a lot harder to remember the paradigm than the syntax of a language (and unless you look at some good existing code, you probably won't learn the paradigm). Just translating FORTRAN into C is not good enough. >I think the only way to rectify this unfortunate situation, is to require >that computer language classes teach more the one at a time. Say, showing >examples of code in atleast three different languages for every problem. >I seriously doubt this will every happen, but I can always hope. The languages you mentioned are not all that different; they are all von Neumann type languages. By programming in, say C, FORTRAN, and Pascal you really don't learn new ways of approaching a problem. Using C, LISP, and Smalltalk for the same problem might be a better use of time. -- _ __ NEVIN J. LIBER ..!ihnp4!ihlpf!nevin1 (312) 510-6194 ' ) ) "The secret compartment of my ring I fill / / _ , __o ____ with an Underdog super-energy pill." / (_