Path: utzoo!utgpu!attcan!uunet!lll-winken!lll-lcc!mordor!joyce!sri-unix!garth!smryan
From: smryan@garth.UUCP (Steven Ryan)
Newsgroups: comp.lang.c
Subject: Re: Need C language Description
Message-ID: <1112@garth.UUCP>
Date: 30 Jul 88 21:03:14 GMT
References: <12707@agate.BERKELEY.EDU> <1104@garth.UUCP> <8270@brl-smoke.ARPA>
Reply-To: smryan@garth.UUCP (Steven Ryan)
Organization: INTERGRAPH (APD) -- Palo Alto, CA
Lines: 24

In article <8270@brl-smoke.ARPA> gwyn@brl.arpa (Doug Gwyn (VLD/VMB) <gwyn>) writes:
>>You can get a language description out of K+R, but forget about a formal
>>definition unless you want to do it yourself.
>
>If you don't know what you're talking about, then please shut up.

If you know what you're talking about, show us.
 
>The fellow can probably get what he's looking for, and more, by
>talking with the people at Metaware, Tom Penello for example.
>They specialize in formal semantics.  Metaware advertises their
>compiler in various PC magazines.

A compiler is not a definition. A compiler is an implementation of a
definition.

They specialise in formal semantics? What have they actually done?

When I talk about formal definition I do not mean the usual garbage you see
in Ans languages or stuff like K+R. I mean something like the PL/I
definition or the Revised Algol 68 Report. Formal syntax, context free and
context sensitive, and formal semantics.

If there was a formal definition, three-quarters of the topics in
comp.lang.c would never appear.