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From: billwolf%hazel.cs.clemson.edu@hubcap.clemson.edu (William Thomas Wolfe, 2847 )
Newsgroups: comp.lang.c,comp.software-eng
Subject: Re: Currency Quotes
Message-ID: <8229@hubcap.clemson.edu>
Date: 4 Mar 90 19:11:08 GMT
References: <803@xyzzy.UUCP>
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Reply-To: billwolf%hazel.cs.clemson.edu@hubcap.clemson.edu
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From goudreau@larrybud.rtp.dg.com (Bob Goudreau):
> I was talking about your original criticism of units(1) for the way
> its manpage admitted that the program had no way of automatically
> updating its exchange-rate information in real-time.  You came to
> the embarassingly stupid conclusion that this limitation was somehow
> a fault of the C programming language.  But go ahead and defend that
> conclusion if you must....

   No, it was an example of the C community's cavalier attitude
   toward software reliability.  The comment "Don't base your
   financial plans on the output", or words to that effect, were
   a) inappropriate, since the static nature of the rates is part
   of the specification and should not be listed in the defects
   section, and b) irresponsible, since it indicates a flippant
   approach to the reliability of the output.


   Bill Wolfe, wtwolfe@hubcap.clemson.edu