Path: utzoo!attcan!uunet!husc6!ogccse!blake!uw-beaver!fluke!mce
From: mce@tc.fluke.COM (Brian McElhinney)
Newsgroups: comp.sys.mac
Subject: Re: Rooms? (Was: Finder Improvements)
Message-ID: <6105@fluke.COM>
Date: 23 Nov 88 18:47:07 GMT
References: <6217@netnews.upenn.edu> <10330083@eecs.nwu.edu>
Sender: news@tc.fluke.COM
Organization: SRS Recursive Software, Castrovalva, WA
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In article <10330083@eecs.nwu.edu> bob@eecs.nwu.edu (Bob Hablutzel) writes:
>Most applications are written in high level languages these days, by teams of
>programmers. I'm sorry, and you can disagree, but there is _no way_ that 
>high level code can match the size and speed compactness of assembly language
>programming. This has nothing to do with using tricks of the chip, or black 
>magic, but because high level languages require support routines and the
>like which assembly language code can avoid.

True enough, if you have an infinite amount of time; there is also _no way_
that a team of programmers can develop and test code in the same amount of
time using low-level tools (assembly language).  You just can't manage a large
amount of arbitrary complexity without high level tools.  Best put by the (so
far as I know) anonymous quote:

	"Newton said that if he had seen further than others it was because he
	was standing on the shoulders of giants.  The problem with software
	engineering is that we're all standing on each other's toes."

Obviously, we still have a long way to go yet, even with high level languages.

Assembly language is useful in it's place, but only there.  I would wager that
most of the speed and compactness improvements are due to better work habits
forced on you by the lack of type checking, etc., of assembly language.  The
same skills would serve you just as well in any software environment.
 
 
Brian McElhinney
mce@tc.fluke.com