David Crayford writes (à propos of C++): | Strong typing alone is worth the effort.
This is an eminently respectable view; it is now even, I suppose, the norm; but as I have had occasion to note here before, it is akin to a preference for NEWSPEAK over standard English: it sacrifices expressive power to ideological purity. I do not often make the programming errors it notionally guards against, having made them long ago and learned not to repeat them; and I find that its use, without finally precluding them, makes things like data-type punning more difficult and much less transparent than they should be. Moreover, it has not been my experience that programming errors are less frequent in shops that use C++ all but exclusively than they are in other shops that use older, more expressive languages. My point here is not, of course, to argue that Mr Crayford or anyone else should not use C++ [or another nanny language like Pascal] if they wish to do so. It is only to make clear that alternative views exist. --jg On 9/18/12, Tony Harminc <t...@harminc.net> wrote: > On 18 September 2012 01:40, David Crayford <dcrayf...@gmail.com> wrote: >> I consider C++ a much safer language than C, wrt to both string handling >> and >> memory management. In fact, I find it difficult to fathom why anybody >> would still write C code when C++ is such a superior language. Strong >> typing >> alone is worth the effort. > > Perhaps when Metal C++ becomes available... > > Tony H. > > ---------------------------------------------------------------------- > For IBM-MAIN subscribe / signoff / archive access instructions, > send email to lists...@listserv.ua.edu with the message: INFO IBM-MAIN > ---------------------------------------------------------------------- For IBM-MAIN subscribe / signoff / archive access instructions, send email to lists...@listserv.ua.edu with the message: INFO IBM-MAIN
