Path: utzoo!attcan!uunet!husc6!bloom-beacon!apple!bionet!agate!ucbvax!PINOCCHIO.BERKELEY.EDU!bzs
From: bzs@PINOCCHIO.BERKELEY.EDU (Barry Shein)
Newsgroups: comp.society.futures
Subject: Fortran and Pascal
Message-ID: <8811051500.AA23345@pinocchio.UUCP>
Date: 5 Nov 88 15:00:31 GMT
References: <384@uceng.UC.EDU>
Sender: daemon@ucbvax.BERKELEY.EDU
Organization: The Internet
Lines: 38


From: uccba!uceng!dmocsny@tut.cis.ohio-state.edu  (daniel mocsny)
>The most expensive computer component you own is the code you have written.
>Why must the computer manufacturers constantly attempt to destroy your
>wealth by not acknowledging this? If they won't provide compilers, then
>why can't they make a serious effort to provide source-code translators?
>Instead, this is a fringe market left to third-parties or individuals.

Whoa whoa whoa...hold on there a minute...

Are the computer vendors *really* constantly attempting to destroy
your wealth by not acknowledging this? How many systems do you know of
that don't provide (reasonable) Fortran (eg) compilers?

It's all market driven, if there's a market the compiler will appear
soon enough, it's an obvious product.

I also don't know why you seem to feel that third-party compilers are
somehow an inferior solution. In many cases they are first rate and
probably better than what a vendor would produce, why do you think
hardware manufacturers automatically have some magic ability to manage
good compiler projects? Companies like Borland, Greenhills and even
the Free Software Foundation (not a company) have produced first rate
compilers by any standards.

Maybe you could put a little more meat in your complaints so we can
see if we're misunderstanding you?

>Individuals and corporations have $ billions sunk into Fortran and Cobol
>code. If the computer vendors refuse to acknowledge this, forcing customers
>to sink additional $ billions into re-writing all of it, they might as
>well be tossing Molotov cocktails into your office.

No, they might as well be tossing Molotov cocktails into *their*
offices, I presume you will ask and not purchase systems which don't
have the compilers you require?

	-Barry Shein, ||Encore||