Newsgroups: comp.lang.c++,comp.lang.smalltalk,comp.object
Path: cantaloupe.srv.cs.cmu.edu!das-news2.harvard.edu!news2.near.net!news.mathworks.com!uunet!mole-end!mat
From: mat@mole-end.matawan.nj.us
Subject: Re: C++ Productivity
Message-ID: <1995Feb4.210947.718@mole-end.matawan.nj.us>
Organization: :
References: <1995Jan23.193745.7044@boole.com> <jim.fleming.84.00133AB6@bytes.com> <D3FuGq.Kwv@da_vinci.ecte.uswc.uswest.com>
Date: Sat, 4 Feb 1995 21:09:47 GMT
Lines: 38
Xref: glinda.oz.cs.cmu.edu comp.lang.c++:111016 comp.lang.smalltalk:20369 comp.object:26149

In article <D3FuGq.Kwv@da_vinci.ecte.uswc.uswest.com>, tblanch@lookout (Todd Blanchard) writes:
> Robert Martin (rmartin@rcmcon.com) wrote:
> : tblanch@lookout (Todd Blanchard) writes:
 
> : >Here, perhaps is the point.  The C++ language is entirely too large and
> : >complex.  
 
> : Certainly it is large and complex.  But not "too large" nor "too
> : complex".  If it were, then it would not be selling as well as it is.
> : You can claim that the purchasers don't really know what they are
> : buying, but that is a pretty weak argument.
 
> I could argue that if Windows wasn't a technically elegant architecture
> then no-one would buy it either.  ...

And I could argue that if poodles didn't have wings, they'd make poorer
pets ... but that's besides the point.

> And I submit that C++ is at least an order of magnitude larger and more
> complex than C, Pascal, Cobol, FORTRAN, or whatever.

But unlike Windows, it provides rewards for mastering the complexity.
Look at _Scientific and Engineering C++_ (Barton and Nackman, AW).
Their templates capture--and need!--the concepts of higher algebra
(abelian, semi-abelian, non-abelian groups, moniods, etc.).  They
allow strict checking of dimensional correctness at (virtually) no
runtime cost.

There is a revolution brewing in programming, and it's C++'s templates
that will bring it about.

The question is not `which language will replace C++?' but `what
preprocessing will people invent to make writing templates less clumsy?'
-- 
 (This man's opinions are his own.)
 From mole-end				Mark Terribile
 mat@mole-end.matawan.nj.us, Somewhere in Matawan, NJ
	(Training and consulting in C, C++, UNIX, etc.)
