Path: utzoo!attcan!uunet!husc6!cmcl2!rutgers!apple!vsi1!daver!athsys!jim
From: jim@athsys.uucp (Jim Becker)
Newsgroups: comp.lang.c++
Subject: Re: C++ too complex!?!?! (vs. Russian)
Message-ID: <181@tityus.UUCP>
Date: 12 Nov 88 02:30:53 GMT
References: <31900004@eamoore>
Organization: Athena Systems, Inc., Sunnyvale, CA
Lines: 40

From article <31900004@eamoore>, by eamoore@eamoore.applicon.UUCP:
> 
> /* Written  7:27 am  Nov  1, 1988 by imspw6.UUCP!bob in eamoore:comp.lang.c++ */
> /* ---------- "Re: C++ too complex!?!?!" ---------- */
> 
> 
> David Smyth and apparently one or two other people on the net seem to
> think that C++ is too complex.  Compared to what?  My suggestion to
> these people is to try to learn Russian (2 forms of all verbs, 100 
> forms of all motion verbs, 6 declension cases etc. etc.).  Afterwards,
> the marvelous simplicity of C++ shall be apparent to them.
> 
> Ted Holden
> HTE
> /* End of text from eamoore:comp.lang.c++ */

	My parents are both in their sixties, and are both learning
Russian.  They are making good progress. I don't think that I could
ever teach them how to use an IBM PC though, there is just so much
that you have to learn to get going. But I assume that they could
learn the Mac, given the inclination.

	This is a restatement of my big argument, is C++ intended to
be a tool that makes application development easier for the novice,
or simply more concise for the expert? There are certain languages,
such as Pascal, that make structured programming and other good 
techniques come more naturally than other alternatives, such as
fortran. (Hey, I LIKE Fortran). The experience that I have with
seeing programmers use C++ is that there is more rope than in other
languages for their own hanging. It's easier for programmers to write 
difficult to understand logic flow control in C++ than in C; one
can always pretty easily trace program flow on paper using C, but
C++ is more difficult.

	I think that there is great room for C++ to be wonderful,
but a Smalltalk type environment seems to be the real need before
it's advantages can really be made to shine. Otherwise the header
files and dependencies can get unwieldy with larger projects.

-Jim Becker