Path: utzoo!attcan!uunet!lll-winken!lll-tis!ames!mailrus!uflorida!gatech!udel!burdvax!ubbpc!wgh
From: wgh@ubbpc.UUCP (William G. Hutchison)
Newsgroups: comp.lang.fortran
Subject: Re: Why have FORTRAN 8x at all?
Summary: No, not facetious, just looking at history.
Keywords: FORTRAN PL/I kludge
Message-ID: <391@ubbpc.UUCP>
Date: 1 Nov 88 14:16:22 GMT
References: <388@ubbpc.UUCP> <16187@agate.BERKELEY.EDU>
Organization: UNISYS CS, Blue Bell, PA
Lines: 40

In article <16187@agate.BERKELEY.EDU>, link@sag4.ssl.berkeley.edu (Richard Link) writes:
> In article <388@ubbpc.UUCP> wgh@ubbpc.UUCP (William G. Hutchison) writes:
> > I haven't programmed seriously in FORTRAN for a decade or so, so maybe some
> >FORTRAN advocates can tell me something: why is there an effort to make up
> >a new standard at all?
> The reason for a new standard is:
> (1) there is a huge investment in already written code
> (2) FORTRAN is the most useful (existing) language for number crunching.
> Why should I, or anyone else, rewrite millions lines of code simply
> because somebody else, who has not programmed in FORTRAN for ten years,
> thinks a new language is more desireable? Your arguments are certainly
> not going to get me to change to something else.
> 
> Now that I've said all this, I wonder: are you being facetious?


Dr. Link:
 No, I am not facetious, and you misunderstood one of my points: I am NOT
advocating that you change to another programming language.  My question is
Why not leave FORTRAN 77 alone and stop messing with FORTRAN?

 Here is the historical paradigm I am looking at:
  Algol-60 was a breakthough, excellent language; widely used as a publication
language and used in Europe as a practical language.  So a committee decided
to "improve" Algol-60 to Algol-68.  You may recall the result: Algol-68 was
"improved" to the point of being unusable.  Very few implementations ever were
finished: hardly anybody ever managed to get through the language spec.
 IBM decided to "improve" FORTRAN and COBOL: they produced PL/I: another
semi-usable mess.
 From the comments IN THIS GROUP, I conclude that FORTRAN 8x is evolving into
another committee-designed mess, which I doubt sincerely will serve anybody
well.  
 So I ask again, why have FORTRAN 8x at all? (not facetious!).
 As for your point about preserving your investment in FORTRAN-66 or
FORTRAN-77, I suggest that you keep on programming in FORTRAN-66 or FORTRAN-77!

-- 
Bill Hutchison, DP Consultant	rutgers!cbmvax!burdvax!ubbpc!wgh
Unisys UNIX Portation Center	"What one fool can do, another can!"
P.O. Box 500, M.S. B121		Ancient Simian Proverb, quoted by
Blue Bell, PA 19424		Sylvanus P. Thompson, in _Calculus Made Easy_