Re: What are OOP's Jargons and Complexities

[Bart Willems]

> 
> Even better: pick one entry of your choice from
> 
> http://images.google.com/images?q=%22don%27t+feed+the+troll%22
> 
> 
> Michele

OMG and here I am thinking that Ken Rockwell's site is full of crap. 
This one's worse... Does the guy have a job? Or a life?
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Re: What are OOP's Jargons and Complexities

[Lew]

Michele Dondi wrote:
> Even better: pick one entry of your choice from
> 
> http://images.google.com/images?q=%22don%27t+feed+the+troll%22

I pick 

-- Lew
-- 
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Re: What are OOP's Jargons and Complexities

[Lew]

Arved Sandstrom wrote:
> "Timofei Shatrov" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote in message 
> news:[EMAIL PROTECTED]
>> On Fri, 30 Mar 2007 06:48:05 GMT, "Mike Schilling" 
>> <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
>> tried to confuse everyone with this message:
>>
>>> Xah Lee wrote:
>>>
 So, a simple code like this in normal languages:
 becomes in Java:
>>> Only when written by someone almost entirely ignorant of Java.
>>>
>> Which is the state most people want to be in...
> 
> Which based on what I've seen, is the state that most Java programmers are 
> in. They'd have no idea why Mike said what he did.

what EVerrr!

-- Lew
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Re: What are OOP's Jargons and Complexities

[Michele Dondi]

On Fri, 30 Mar 2007 09:28:36 +0100, bugbear
<[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote:

>Er. How about
>
>public class test {
>   public static void main(String[] args) {
> String a = "a string";
> String b = "another one";
> StringBuffer c = a + b;
> System.out.println(c);
> }
>}

Even better: pick one entry of your choice from

http://images.google.com/images?q=%22don%27t+feed+the+troll%22


Michele
-- 
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(($a||=join'',map--$|x$_,(unpack'w',unpack'u','G^http://mail.python.org/mailman/listinfo/python-list

Re: What are OOP's Jargons and Complexities

[Arved Sandstrom]

"Mike Schilling" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote in message 
news:[EMAIL PROTECTED]
> bugbear wrote:
>> Er. How about
>>
>> public class test {
>>   public static void main(String[] args) {
>> String a = "a string";
>> String b = "another one";
>> StringBuffer c = a + b;
>
> String c (etc.), that is.

My answer, Mike. Since there was never any need for variables "a" and "b" to 
be separate, I'd just be blatting out

System.out.println("a stringanother one");

as the solution to this particular problem. It's just a confuscated Hello 
World.

AHS 


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Re: What are OOP's Jargons and Complexities

[Arved Sandstrom]

"Timofei Shatrov" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote in message 
news:[EMAIL PROTECTED]
> On Fri, 30 Mar 2007 06:48:05 GMT, "Mike Schilling" 
> <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
> tried to confuse everyone with this message:
>
>>Xah Lee wrote:
>>
>>> So, a simple code like this in normal languages:
>
>>> becomes in Java:
>>
>>Only when written by someone almost entirely ignorant of Java.
>>
>
> Which is the state most people want to be in...

Which based on what I've seen, is the state that most Java programmers are 
in. They'd have no idea why Mike said what he did.

AHS 


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Re: What are OOP's Jargons and Complexities

[Mike Schilling]

bugbear wrote:
> Er. How about
>
> public class test {
>   public static void main(String[] args) {
> String a = "a string";
> String b = "another one";
> StringBuffer c = a + b;

String c (etc.), that is.

> System.out.println(c);
> }
> }


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Re: What are OOP's Jargons and Complexities

[Mike Schilling]

Timofei Shatrov wrote:
> On Fri, 30 Mar 2007 06:48:05 GMT, "Mike Schilling"
> <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> tried to confuse everyone with this
> message:
>
>> Xah Lee wrote:
>>
>>> So, a simple code like this in normal languages:
>
>>> becomes in Java:
>>>
>>>
>>
>> Only when written by someone almost entirely ignorant of Java.
>>
>
> Which is the state most people want to be in...

Most of them have the brains not to display their ignorance so widely. 


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Re: What are OOP's Jargons and Complexities

[Lew]

Xah Lee wrote:
>> public class test {
>>   public static void main(String[] args) {
>> String a = new String("a string");
>> String b = new String("another one");
>> StringBuffer c = new StringBuffer(40);
>> c.append(a); c.append(b);
>> System.out.println(c.toString());
>> }
>> }
> 
> Er. How about
> 
> public class test {
>   public static void main(String[] args) {
> String a = "a string";
> String b = "another one";
> StringBuffer c = a + b;
> System.out.println(c);
> }
> }

bugbear wrote:
> Alternatively I could recode your Lisp example
> as badly as you coded your Java.

 From what I've seen and heard of Xah Lee, you'd probably lose the bad-coding 
competition to him. He's a professional.

-- Lew
-- 
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Re: What are OOP's Jargons and Complexities

[Lew]

Timofei Shatrov wrote:
> On Fri, 30 Mar 2007 06:48:05 GMT, "Mike Schilling" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
> tried to confuse everyone with this message:
> 
>> Xah Lee wrote:
>>
>>> So, a simple code like this in normal languages:
> 
>>> becomes in Java:
>>>
>>>
>> Only when written by someone almost entirely ignorant of Java. 
>>
> 
> Which is the state most people want to be in...

As a particular case of the general proposition that most people want to be 
ignorant of computer programming.

-- Lew
-- 
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Re: What are OOP's Jargons and Complexities

[bugbear]

Xah Lee wrote:

> So, a simple code like this in normal languages:
> 
> a = "a string";
> b = "another one";
> c = join(a,b);
> print c;
> 
> or in lisp style
> 
> (set a "a string")
> (set b "another one")
> (set c (join a b))
> (print c)
> 
> becomes in Java:
> 
> public class test {
>   public static void main(String[] args) {
> String a = new String("a string");
> String b = new String("another one");
> StringBuffer c = new StringBuffer(40);
> c.append(a); c.append(b);
> System.out.println(c.toString());
> }
> }

Er. How about

public class test {
   public static void main(String[] args) {
 String a = "a string";
 String b = "another one";
 StringBuffer c = a + b;
 System.out.println(c);
 }
}

Alternatively I could recode your Lisp example
as badly as you coded your Java.

   BugBear
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Re: What are OOP's Jargons and Complexities

[Timofei Shatrov]

On Fri, 30 Mar 2007 06:48:05 GMT, "Mike Schilling" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
tried to confuse everyone with this message:

>Xah Lee wrote:
>
>> So, a simple code like this in normal languages:

>> becomes in Java:
>>
>>
>
>Only when written by someone almost entirely ignorant of Java. 
>

Which is the state most people want to be in...

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|It's us against millions and we can't take them all... |  ue il   |
|But we can take them on!   | @ma  |
|   (A Wilhelm Scream - The Rip)|__|
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Re: What are OOP's Jargons and Complexities

[Mike Schilling]

Xah Lee wrote:

> So, a simple code like this in normal languages:
>
> a = "a string";
> b = "another one";
> c = join(a,b);
> print c;
>
> or in lisp style
>
> (set a "a string")
> (set b "another one")
> (set c (join a b))
> (print c)
>
> becomes in Java:
>
> public class test {
>   public static void main(String[] args) {
> String a = new String("a string");
> String b = new String("another one");
> StringBuffer c = new StringBuffer(40);
> c.append(a); c.append(b);
> System.out.println(c.toString());
> }
> }
>

Only when written by someone almost entirely ignorant of Java. 


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Re: What are OOP's Jargons and Complexities

[Mirco Wahab]

James Stroud wrote:

there's a serious bug waiting here

> This idiot is a troll. This idiot is a troll. ThThis idiot is a troll. 
> This idiot is a troll. is idiot is a troll. This idiot is a troll. This 

Remember, rockets went back to earth on such things (in pieces) ...

> idiot is a troll. This idiot is a troll. This idiot is a troll. This 

better use Xah's "functional paradigm" combined
with his most hated religion instead:


 print "This idiot is a troll. " x 42



Regards & f'up c.l.java.p

Mirco
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Re: What are OOP's Jargons and Complexities

[James Stroud]

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Re: What are OOP's Jargons and Complexities

[Lew]

Uri Guttman wrote:
> please DO NOT EVER followup xah's posts into comp.lang.perl.misc. he is
> not wanted there and is considered a troll. he hates perl so why he
> crossposts there is a question. if you want to followup, post only in
> your own group. keep him and his useless threads out of c.l.p.misc.

We've heard similar reports about Xah Lee on other newsgroups as well.

-- Lew
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Re: What are OOP's Jargons and Complexities

[Uri Guttman]

please DO NOT EVER followup xah's posts into comp.lang.perl.misc. he is
not wanted there and is considered a troll. he hates perl so why he
crossposts there is a question. if you want to followup, post only in
your own group. keep him and his useless threads out of c.l.p.misc.

uri

-- 
Uri Guttman  --  [EMAIL PROTECTED]   http://www.stemsystems.com
--Perl Consulting, Stem Development, Systems Architecture, Design and Coding-
Search or Offer Perl Jobs    http://jobs.perl.org
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Re: What are OOP's Jargons and Complexities

[Jon Harrop]

Xah Lee wrote:
> As part of this new syntax and purity, where everything in a program
> is of Classes and Objects and Methods, many complex issues and concept
> have arisen in OOP from both the OOP language machinery as well as a
> engineering practice.

I think the fact that many design patterns from OOP are redundant in the
presence of functional programming is very interesting. I'd like to see
more written about this, not least because it would serve as an excellent
introduction to functional programming for the majority of programmers who
are versed only in object orientation (primarily C++, Java and C#
programmers).

There is an old paper on the GOF's OOP design patterns implemented in OCaml
but it was not written by OCaml-savvy programmers and contained many errors
and omissions. Perhaps the Lisp community have generated something better?

Also, pattern matching is fundamental to many modern functional programming
languages. Here, pattern matching is often the only way to manipulate
concrete data structures and often results in code that is both faster and
more concise than any object-oriented equivalent. I recently gave the
example of a small symbolic simplifier written in OCaml/F# that is
difficult and tedious to translate into many other languages efficiently
(including C++, Java, C# and even Lisp).

-- 
Dr Jon D Harrop, Flying Frog Consultancy
OCaml for Scientists
http://www.ffconsultancy.com/products/ocaml_for_scientists/index.html?usenet
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What are OOP's Jargons and Complexities

[Xah Lee]

What are OOP's Jargons and Complexities

Xah Lee, 20050128

Classes, Methods, Objects

In computer languages, often a function definition looks like this:

subroutine f (x1, x2, ...) {
  variables ...
  do this or that
}

In advanced languages such as LISP family, it is not uncommon to
define functions inside a function. For example:

subroutine f (x1, x2, ...) {
  variables...
  subroutine f1 (x1...) {...}
  subroutine f2 (x1...) {...}
}

Often these f1 f2 inner functions are used inside f, and are not
relevant outside of f. Such power of the language gradually developed
into a style of programing. For example:

subroutine a_surface () {
  coordinatesList = ...;
  subroutine translate (distance) {...}
  subroutine rotate (angle) {..}
}

Such a style is that the a_surface is no longer viewed as a function.
But instead, a boxed set of functions, centered around a piece of
datum. And, all functions for manipulating this piece of datum are all
embodied in this function. For example:

subroutine a_surface (arg) {
  coordinatesList = ...
  subroutine translate (distance) {set coordinatesList to translated
version}
  subroutine rotate (angle) {set coordinatesList to rotated version}
  subroutine return () {return coordinatesList}

  if (no arg) {do nothing}
else { apply arg to coordinatesList }
}

In this way, one uses a_surface as a piece of datum that are bundled
with its own set of functions:

mySurface = a_surface   // assign subroutine to a variable
mySurface(rotate(angle))// now the surface datum has been
rotated
mySurface(translate(distance))  // now its translated
newSurface = mySurface(return())

So now, a_surface is no longer viewed as a subroutine, but a boxed set
of things centered around a piece of datum. All functions that work on
the datum are included in the boxed set. This paradigm possible in
functional languages has refined so much so that it spread to other
groups and became known as Object Oriented Programing, and complete
languages with new syntax catered to such scheme emerged.

In such languages, instead of writing them like this:

mySurface = a_surface;
mySurface(rotate(angle));

the syntax is changed to like this, for example:

mySurface = new a_surface();
mySurface.rotate(angle);

In such languages, the super subroutine a_surface is no longer called
a function or subroutine. It is now called a “Class”. And now the
variable holding the function "mySurface" is now called a “Object”.
Subroutines inside the function a_surface are no longer called inner-
subroutines. They are called “Methods”. The act of assigning a super-
subroutine to a variable is called instantiation.

This style of programing and language has become so fanatical that in
such dedicated languages like Java, everything in the language are
Classes. One can no longer just define a variable or subroutine.
Instead, one defines these super-subroutines (classes) that has inner-
subroutines (methods). Every line of code are now inside such super-
subroutine. And one assigns subroutines to variables inside other
subroutines to create objects. And one calls inner-subroutines
(methods) thru these “object” variables to manipulate the data defined
in the super-subroutine. In this fashion, even basic primitives like
numbers, strings, and lists are no longer atomic entities. They are
now subroutines with inner-subroutines.

For example, in Java, a string is a class String. And inside the class
String, there are Methods to manipulate strings, such as finding the
number of chars, or extracting parts of the string. This can get very
complicated. For example, in Java, there are actually two Classes of
strings: One is String, and the other is StringBuffer. Which one to
use depends on whether you intend to change the datum.

So, a simple code like this in normal languages:

a = "a string";
b = "another one";
c = join(a,b);
print c;

or in lisp style

(set a "a string")
(set b "another one")
(set c (join a b))
(print c)

becomes in Java:

public class test {
  public static void main(String[] args) {
String a = new String("a string");
String b = new String("another one");
StringBuffer c = new StringBuffer(40);
c.append(a); c.append(b);
System.out.println(c.toString());
}
}

Here, the “new String” creates a String object. The “new
StringBuffer(40)” creates the changeable string object StringBuffer,
with room for 40 chars. “append” is a method of StringBuffer. It is
used to join two Strings.

Notice the syntax “c.append(a)”, which we can view it as calling a
inner-subroutine “append”, on a super-subroutine that has been
assigned to c, where, the inner-subroutine modifies the inner datum by
appending the value of a to it.

And in the above Java example, StringBuffer class has another method
“toString()” used to convert this into a String Class, necessary
because System.out.println's parameter requires a String type, no

Re: What are OOP's Jargons and Complexities?

[Xah Lee]

The Rise of Class Hierarchy

Because of psychological push for purity, in Java there are no longer
plain subroutines. Everything is a method of some class. Standard
functions like opening a file, square root a number, for loop thru a
list, if else branching statements, or simple arithmetic operations...
must now somehow become a method of some class. In this way, coupled
with the all-important need to manage data with inheritance, the OOP
Class Hierarchy is born.

Basic data types such as now the various classes of numbers, are now
grouped into a Number class hierarchy, each class having their own set
of methods. The characters, string or other data types, are lumped into
one hierarchy class of data types. Many types of lists (variously known
as arrays, vectors, lists, hashes...), are lumped into a one hierarchy,
with each Classe node having its own set methods as appropriate. Math
functions, are lumped into some math class hierarchy.

Now suppose the plus operation +, where does it go? Should it become
methods of the various classes under Number headings, or should it be
methods of the Math class set? Each language deals with these issues
differently. As a example, see this page for the hierarchy of Java's
core language classes:
http://java.sun.com/j2se/1.4.2/docs/api/java/lang/package-tree.html
(local copy)

OOP being inherently complex exacerbated by marketing propaganda, and
the inheritance and hierarchy concept is so entangled in OOP, sometimes
OOP is erroneously thought of as languages with a hierarchy. (there are
now also so-called Object-Oriented databases that ride the fad of
“all data are trees” ...)

Normally in a program, when we want to do some operation we just call
the subroutine on some data. Such as
open(this_file)
square(4)

But now with the pure OOP style, there can no longer be just a number
or this_file path, because everything now must be a Object. So, the
"this_file", usually being just a string representing the path to a
file on the disk, is now some "file object". Initiated by something
like
this_file = new File("path to file");

where this file class has a bunch of methods such as reading or writing
to it.

see this page for the complexity of the IO tree
http://java.sun.com/j2se/1.4.2/docs/api/java/io/package-tree.html
(local copy)

see this page for the documentation of the File class itself, along
with its 40 or so methods and other things.
http://java.sun.com/j2se/1.4.2/docs/api/java/io/File.html (local copy)

---
to be continued...

This is part of an installment of the article
“What are OOP's Jargons and Complexities”
by Xah Lee, 20050128. The full text is at
 http://xahlee.org/Periodic_dosage_dir/t2/oop.html

© Copyright 2005 by Xah Lee. Verbatim duplication of the complete
article for non-profit purposes is granted.

The article is published in the following newsgroups:
comp.lang.c,comp.lang.c++,comp.lang.lisp,comp.unix.programmer
comp.lang.python,comp.lang.perl.misc,comp.lang.scheme,comp.lang.java.programmer
comp.lang.functional,comp.object,comp.software-eng,comp.software.patterns

 Xah
 [EMAIL PROTECTED]
∑ http://xahlee.org/

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Re: What are OOP's Jargons and Complexities?

[Andrea Griffini]

On Sun, 05 Jun 2005 16:30:18 +0200, Matthias Buelow <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
wrote:

>Quite embarrassing, but it's a runtime bug and got nothing to do with
>the language per se.  And it certainly manifests itself after the
>hey-days of Turbo Pascal (when Borland seems to have lost interest in
>maintaining it.)

The point is not the bug, of course, but how borland handled
it. It appeared when the user community of borland pascal
was well alive and kicking, but borland didn't even invest
5 seconds for the issue. The users had to fix the library
themselves (possible because at that time with Borland Pascal
you were getting the whole source code of the library; but
note that it was a 100% genuine bug due to misprogramming,
fixing it even on a dead product would have been the a nice
move from borland). The user community went even further,
as so many executables were written witn borland pascal that
a special tool for binary patching executables was built
(actually a few of them, as being unofficial it wasn't
that simple to get to know that such a tool existed, so
different people independently resorted to the same solution).

Andrea
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Re: What are OOP's Jargons and Complexities?

[Matthias Buelow]

Andrea Griffini wrote:

>>Of course it is a language, just not a standardized one (if you include
>>Borland's extensions that make it practical).
> 
> The history of "runtime error 200" and its handling from
> borland is a clear example of what I mean with a product.

Hmm, I had to google this up...

Quite embarrassing, but it's a runtime bug and got nothing to do with
the language per se.  And it certainly manifests itself after the
hey-days of Turbo Pascal (when Borland seems to have lost interest in
maintaining it.)

mkb.
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Re: What are OOP's Jargons and Complexities?

[Dale King]

Anno Siegel wrote:
> Tassilo v. Parseval <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote in comp.lang.perl.misc:
> 
>>Also sprach Dale King:
>>
>>
>>>David Formosa (aka ? the Platypus) wrote:
>>>
On Tue, 24 May 2005 09:16:02 +0200, Tassilo v. Parseval
<[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote: 


>[...] I haven't yet come across a language that is both statically and
>strongly typed, in the strictest sense of the words. I wonder whether
>such a language would be usable at all.


Modula2 claims to be both statically typed and strongly typed.  And
your wonder at its usablity is justified.
>>>
>>>I used a variant of Modula-2 and it was one of the best languages I have 
>>>ever used. That strong, static type checking was a very good thing. It 
>>>often took a lot of work to get the code to compile without error. 
>>>Usually those errors were the programmers fault for trying to play fast 
>>>and loose with data. But once you got it to compile it nearly always worked.
>>
>>I am only familiar with its successor Modula-3 which, as far as I
>>understand, is Modula-2 with uppercased keywords and some OO-notion
>>bolted onto it (I still recall 'BRANDED' references). 
>>
>>I have to say that doing anything with this language was not exactly a
>>delight.
> 
> 
> I've been through Pascal, Modula2 and Oberon, and I agree.
> 
> These languages had an axe to grind.  They were designed (by Niklas
> Wirth) at a time of a raging discussion whether structured programming
> (goto-less programming, mostly) is practical.  Their goal was to prove
> that it is, and in doing so the restrictive aspects of the language
> were probably a bit overdone.

I fail to see how they were that different in terms of structured 
programming than C. The main benefit I was talking had more to do with 
types. It had types that were not compatible just because they had the 
same base type. For example you could have a type inches that was an 
integer and a type ounces that was also integral. Just because they were 
both integral did not make them type compatible. You couldn't just 
assign one to the other without you as the programmer explicitly saying 
that it was OK (by casting).

In the environment I was programming in (engine controls for cars) where 
safety was a critical thing and a programming bug could kill people that 
safety was a very good thing. I think that also has a lot to do with why 
  the government uses Ada.

> In the short run they succeeded.  For a number of years, languages of
> that family were widely used, primarily in educational programming
> but also in implementing large real-life systems.
> 
> In the long run, the languages have mostly disappeared from the scene.

I've posted before that hardly any language that has ever been somewhat 
popular has actually died (depending on your definition of that word). 
When asked for someone to name one once I got Simula for example (the 
forerunner of OO languages). Turns out that it continues to actually 
grow in popularity.

> It has been discovered that "structured programming" is possible in
> about any language.  It turns out that programmers prefer the
> self-discipline it takes to do that in a liberal language over the
> enforced discipline exerted by Papa Pascal and his successors.

There are lots of reasons they have not taken over, although Ada is 
still in wide use. It seems to me that too many people like playing with 
dangerous power tools without the guards in place.

-- 
  Dale King
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Re: What are OOP's Jargons and Complexities?

[Andrea Griffini]

On Wed, 01 Jun 2005 23:25:00 +0200, Matthias Buelow <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
wrote:

>Of course it is a language, just not a standardized one (if you include
>Borland's extensions that make it practical).

The history of "runtime error 200" and its handling from
borland is a clear example of what I mean with a product.

You are of course free to call even Microsoft Access a
language (and make long term investment on it) if you want.

Andrea
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Re: What are OOP's Jargons and Complexities?

[Matthias Buelow]

Xah Lee wrote:

> to be continued tomorrow.

Please don't...

mkb.
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Re: What are OOP's Jargons and Complexities?

[Christopher J. Bottaro]

Paul McGuire wrote:

> we just recently on
> this forum had someone ask about "polymorphism" when what they really
> meant was "overloaded method signatures."  (It is even more unfortunate
> that language features such as overloaded method signatures and
> operator overloading get equated with OOP

I've actually heard "overloaded method signatures" be referred to as ad-hoc
polymorphism.  Aren't there like 4 types of polymorphism:  inheritance,
ad-hoc, parameter templetization (sp?), and something else...can't
remember.

-- C

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Re: What are OOP's Jargons and Complexities?

[Xah Lee]

ith a parameter:
class g(f):
  new variables ...
  new inner-subroutines ...


Data are the quintessence in computation. Because in OOP all data are
embodied in classes, and wrapping a class to each and every variety of
data is unmanageable, inheritance became the central means to manage
data.

-
to be continued tomorrow.

This is part of an installment of the article
“What are OOP's Jargons and Complexities”
by Xah Lee, 20050128. The full text is at
 http://xahlee.org/Periodic_dosage_dir/t2/oop.html

© Copyright 2005 by Xah Lee. Verbatim duplication of the complete
article for non-profit purposes is granted.

The article is published in the following newsgroups:
comp.lang.c,comp.lang.c++,comp.lang.lisp,comp.unix.programmer
comp.lang.python,comp.lang.perl.misc,comp.lang.scheme,comp.lang.java.programmer
comp.lang.functional,comp.object,comp.software-eng,comp.software.patterns

 Xah
 [EMAIL PROTECTED]
∑ http://xahlee.org/

-- 
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Re: What are OOP's Jargons and Complexities?

[Ray Dillinger]

Matthias Buelow wrote:

> And btw., I haven't used Pascal in a dozen years but my latest info is
> that Turbo Pascal still lives in the form of "Delphi" for the Windows
> platform.  Surely not "dead" as I understand it.

There's also FreePascal, which compiles approximately the
same language as Turbo Pascal/Delphi, (and inherits most of
Borland's linguistic extensions) and is opensource, works
fine on Unixes, etc.  It's in active use by several people,
making games.

Bear

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Re: What are OOP's Jargons and Complexities?

[Greg Ewing]

Anno Siegel wrote:
> These languages had an axe to grind.  They were designed (by Niklas
> Wirth) at a time of a raging discussion whether structured programming
> (goto-less programming, mostly) is practical.  Their goal was to prove
> that it is, and in doing so the restrictive aspects of the language
> were probably a bit overdone.

This doesn't sound right. That argument might still have
been active at the inception of Pascal, I'm not sure. But
Pascal *does* have a goto statement, although you were
punished a little for using it (numeric labels only, which
had to be declared before use). And surely no-one was arguing
against structured programming by the time Modula came along,
much less Oberon.

The restrictiveness of these languages was mainly in the
type system, which is quite a different issue. And, as has
been pointed out, relaxing the type system of Pascal just
a little has resulted in a very successful family of
languages (UCSD, Turbo, Apple Pascal, etc.)

-- 
Greg Ewing, Computer Science Dept,
University of Canterbury,   
Christchurch, New Zealand
http://www.cosc.canterbury.ac.nz/~greg
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Re: What are OOP's Jargons and Complexities?

[Matthias Buelow]

Andrea Griffini wrote:

>>With a few relaxations and extensions, you can get a surprisingly useful
>>language out of the rigid Pascal, as evidenced by Turbo Pascal, one of
>>the most popular (and practical) programming languages in the late 80ies
>>/ start of the 90ies.
> 
> It was not a language. It was a product in the hand of a single
> company. The difference is that a product can die at the snaps
> of a marketroid, no matter how nice or how diffuse it is.

Of course it is a language, just not a standardized one (if you include
Borland's extensions that make it practical).  But does that matter?
With the exception of Scheme, none of the languages that are the object
of discussion of the newsgroups this thread is being posted to, are
standardized.  Yet they are all quite popular.

And btw., I haven't used Pascal in a dozen years but my latest info is
that Turbo Pascal still lives in the form of "Delphi" for the Windows
platform.  Surely not "dead" as I understand it.

mkb.
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Re: What are OOP's Jargons and Complexities?

[Andrea Griffini]

On Wed, 01 Jun 2005 16:07:58 +0200, Matthias Buelow <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
wrote:

>With a few relaxations and extensions, you can get a surprisingly useful
>language out of the rigid Pascal, as evidenced by Turbo Pascal, one of
>the most popular (and practical) programming languages in the late 80ies
>/ start of the 90ies.

It was not a language. It was a product in the hand of a single
company. The difference is that a product can die at the snaps
of a marketroid, no matter how nice or how diffuse it is.

Andrea
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Re: What are OOP's Jargons and Complexities?

[Matthias Buelow]

Anno Siegel wrote:

> I've been through Pascal, Modula2 and Oberon, and I agree.
> In the short run they succeeded.  For a number of years, languages of
> that family were widely used, primarily in educational programming
> but also in implementing large real-life systems.

With a few relaxations and extensions, you can get a surprisingly useful
language out of the rigid Pascal, as evidenced by Turbo Pascal, one of
the most popular (and practical) programming languages in the late 80ies
/ start of the 90ies.

mkb.
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Re: What are OOP's Jargons and Complexities?

[David Formosa (aka ? the Platypus)]

On Wed, 1 Jun 2005 06:09:43 +0200, Tassilo v. Parseval
<[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote: 

[...]

> I am only familiar with its successor Modula-3 which, as far as I
> understand, is Modula-2 with uppercased keywords and some OO-notion
> bolted onto it (I still recall 'BRANDED' references). 

Modula-2 also overused caps, I recall the irratation I found
programing it was irratating, streaching my finger to hit the shift
key or taking me hands of the home keys to bump the CAPSLOCK key
quick became phisically painfull.


-- 
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http://dformosa.zeta.org.au/~dformosa/Spelling.html to find out more.
Free the Memes.
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Re: What are OOP's Jargons and Complexities?

[Anno Siegel]

Tassilo v. Parseval <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote in comp.lang.perl.misc:
> Also sprach Dale King:
> 
> > David Formosa (aka ? the Platypus) wrote:
> >> On Tue, 24 May 2005 09:16:02 +0200, Tassilo v. Parseval
> >> <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote: 
> >> 
> >>> [...] I haven't yet come across a language that is both statically and
> >>>strongly typed, in the strictest sense of the words. I wonder whether
> >>>such a language would be usable at all.
> >> 
> >> 
> >> Modula2 claims to be both statically typed and strongly typed.  And
> >> your wonder at its usablity is justified.
> >
> > I used a variant of Modula-2 and it was one of the best languages I have 
> > ever used. That strong, static type checking was a very good thing. It 
> > often took a lot of work to get the code to compile without error. 
> > Usually those errors were the programmers fault for trying to play fast 
> > and loose with data. But once you got it to compile it nearly always worked.
> 
> I am only familiar with its successor Modula-3 which, as far as I
> understand, is Modula-2 with uppercased keywords and some OO-notion
> bolted onto it (I still recall 'BRANDED' references). 
> 
> I have to say that doing anything with this language was not exactly a
> delight.

I've been through Pascal, Modula2 and Oberon, and I agree.

These languages had an axe to grind.  They were designed (by Niklas
Wirth) at a time of a raging discussion whether structured programming
(goto-less programming, mostly) is practical.  Their goal was to prove
that it is, and in doing so the restrictive aspects of the language
were probably a bit overdone.

In the short run they succeeded.  For a number of years, languages of
that family were widely used, primarily in educational programming
but also in implementing large real-life systems.

In the long run, the languages have mostly disappeared from the scene.
It has been discovered that "structured programming" is possible in
about any language.  It turns out that programmers prefer the
self-discipline it takes to do that in a liberal language over the
enforced discipline exerted by Papa Pascal and his successors.

Anno
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Re: What are OOP's Jargons and Complexities?

[Tassilo v. Parseval]

Also sprach Dale King:

> David Formosa (aka ? the Platypus) wrote:
>> On Tue, 24 May 2005 09:16:02 +0200, Tassilo v. Parseval
>> <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote: 
>> 
>>> [...] I haven't yet come across a language that is both statically and
>>>strongly typed, in the strictest sense of the words. I wonder whether
>>>such a language would be usable at all.
>> 
>> 
>> Modula2 claims to be both statically typed and strongly typed.  And
>> your wonder at its usablity is justified.
>
> I used a variant of Modula-2 and it was one of the best languages I have 
> ever used. That strong, static type checking was a very good thing. It 
> often took a lot of work to get the code to compile without error. 
> Usually those errors were the programmers fault for trying to play fast 
> and loose with data. But once you got it to compile it nearly always worked.

I am only familiar with its successor Modula-3 which, as far as I
understand, is Modula-2 with uppercased keywords and some OO-notion
bolted onto it (I still recall 'BRANDED' references). 

I have to say that doing anything with this language was not exactly a
delight.

Tassilo
-- 
use bigint;
$n=71423350343770280161397026330337371139054411854220053437565440;
$m=-8,;;$_=$n&(0xff)<<$m,,$_>>=$m,,print+chr,,while(($m+=8)<=200);
-- 
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Re: What are OOP's Jargons and Complexities?

[Dale King]

David Formosa (aka ? the Platypus) wrote:
> On Tue, 24 May 2005 09:16:02 +0200, Tassilo v. Parseval
> <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote: 
> 
>>Also sprach John W. Kennedy:
> 
> [...]
> 
> 
>>Most often, languages with strong typing can be found on the functional
>>front (such as ML and Haskell). These languages have a dynamic typing
>>system. I haven't yet come across a language that is both statically and
>>strongly typed, in the strictest sense of the words. I wonder whether
>>such a language would be usable at all.
> 
> 
> Modula2 claims to be both statically typed and strongly typed.  And
> your wonder at its usablity is justified.

I used a variant of Modula-2 and it was one of the best languages I have 
ever used. That strong, static type checking was a very good thing. It 
often took a lot of work to get the code to compile without error. 
Usually those errors were the programmers fault for trying to play fast 
and loose with data. But once you got it to compile it nearly always worked.

-- 
  Dale King
-- 
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Re: What are OOP's Jargons and Complexities?

[Xah Lee]

the Rise of “Access Specifiers” (or, the Scoping Complexity of OOP)

In programing, a variable has a scope — meaning where the variable
can be seen. Normally, there are two basic models: dynamically scoped
and lexically scoped. Dynamic scoping is basically a time based system,
while lexical scoping is text based (like “what you see is what you
get”). For example, consider the following code:
subroutine f() {return y}
{y=3; print f()}

In dynamic scoping, the printed result is 3, because during evaluation
of the block all values of y is set to 3. In lexical scoping, “y”
is printed because any y in the block is set to 3 before f is called.
With regards to language implementation, Dynamic Scoping is the
no-brainer of the two, and is the model used in earlier languages. Most
of the time, lexical scoping is more natural and desired.

Scoping is also applicable to subroutines. That is to say, where
subroutines can be seen. A subroutine's scope is usually at the level
of source file (or a concept of a module/package/library), because
subroutines are often used in the top level of a source file, as
opposed to inside a code block like variables.

In general, the complexity of scoping is really just how deeply nested
a name appears. For example see in the following code:
name1; // top level names. Usually subroutines, or global
variables.
{
  name2// second level names. Usually variables inside subroutines.
  {
name3  // deeper level names. Less often used in structured
programing.
  }
}

If a programing language uses only one single file of commands in
sequence as in the early languages such as BASIC, there would be no
scoping concept. The whole program is of one single scope.

OOP has created a immense scoping complexity because its mode of
computing is calling nested subroutines (methods) inside subroutines
(classes). We detail some aspects in the following.

In OOP, variables inside subroutines (class variables) can also be
accessed thru a reference the subroutine is assigned to (that is, a
object). In OOP parlance: a variable in a class has a scope, while the
same variable when the class is instantiated (a objet) is a different
scoping issue. In other words, OOP created a new entity “variable
thru reference” that comes with its own scoping issue. For example:
class a_surface() {
  coordinates={...};   // a variable
}

class main() {
  mySurface = new a_surface();
  mySurface.coordinates = {...};   // the same variable
}

In the above code, the variable “coordinates” appears in two
places. Once as defined inside a_surface, and once as a instantiated
version of a_surface, that is, a object. The variable as thru the
object reference apparently has a entirely different scoping issue than
the same variable inside the subroutine (class) definition. The
question for OOP language designers is: what should the scope be for
variables referred thru objects? Within the class the object is
created? within the class the variable is defined? globally? (and what
about inherited classes? (we will cover OOP inheritance later))

As we've seen, methods are just inner-subroutines, and creating objects
to call methods is OOP's paradigm. In this way, names at the
second-level programing structure often associate with variables (and
inner-subroutines), is now brought to the forefront. This is to say,
the scoping of subroutines are raised to a level of complexity as the
scoping of variables. (they are now both in the 2nd level of names (or
deeper).)

All in all, the scoping complexities of OOP as applied to different OOP
entities (classes, class variables, class's methods, object variables
and methods) is manifested as access specifiers in Java. In Java,
access specifiers are keywords “private”, “protected”,
“public”, used to declare the scope of a entity. Together with a
default scope of no-declaration, they create 4 types of scope, and have
entirely different effects when used upon a variable, a method, a
constructor, and a class.

See this tutorial of Java's access specifiers for detail:
http://xahlee.org/java-a-day/access_specifiers.html
-
to be continued tomorrow.

This is part of an installment of the article
“What are OOP's Jargons and Complexities”
by Xah Lee, 20050128. The full text is at
 http://xahlee.org/Periodic_dosage_dir/t2/oop.html

© Copyright 2005 by Xah Lee. Verbatim duplication of the complete
article for non-profit purposes is granted.

The article is published in the following newsgroups:
comp.lang.c,comp.lang.c++,comp.lang.lisp,comp.unix.programmer
comp.lang.python,comp.lang.perl.misc,comp.lang.scheme,comp.lang.java.programmer
comp.lang.functional,comp.object,comp.software-eng,comp.software.patterns

 Xah
 [EMAIL PROTECTED]
∑ http://xahlee.org/

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Re: What are OOP's Jargons and Complexities?

[Xah Lee]

The Rise of “Constructors” and “Accessors”

A instantiation, is when a variable is assigned a super-subroutine
(class). A variable assigned such a super-subroutine is now called a
instance of a class or a object.

In OOP practice, certain inner-subroutines (methods) have developed
into specialized purposes. A inner-subroutine that is always called
when the super-subroutine is assigned to a variable (instantiation), is
called a constructor or initializer. These specialized
inner-subroutines are sometimes given a special status in the language.
For example in Java the language, constructors are different from
methods.

In OOP, it has developed into a practice that in general the data
inside super-subroutines are supposed to be changed only by the
super-subroutine's inner-subroutines, as opposed to by reference thru
the super-subroutine. (In OOP parlance: class's variables are supposed
to be accessed/changed only by the class's methods.) Though this
practice is not universal or absolute. Inner-subroutines that change or
return the value of variables are called accessors. For example, in
Java, a string class's method length() is a accessor.

Because constructors are usually treated as a special method at the
language level, its concept and linguistic issues is a OOP machinery
complexity, while the Accessor concept is a OOP engineering complexity.

-
to be continued tomorrow.

This is part of an installment of the article
“What are OOP's Jargons and Complexities”
by Xah Lee, 20050128. The full text is at
 http://xahlee.org/Periodic_dosage_dir/t2/oop.html

© Copyright 2005 by Xah Lee. Verbatim duplication of the complete
article for non-profit purposes is granted.

The article is published in the following newsgroups:
comp.lang.c,comp.lang.c++,comp.lang.lisp,comp.unix.programmer
comp.lang.python,comp.lang.perl.misc,comp.lang.scheme,comp.lang.java.programmer
comp.lang.functional,comp.object,comp.software-eng,comp.software.patterns

 Xah
 [EMAIL PROTECTED]
∑ http://xahlee.org/

-- 
http://mail.python.org/mailman/listinfo/python-list

Re: What are OOP's Jargons and Complexities?

[James Stroud]

On Friday 27 May 2005 02:15 am, Piet van Oostrum wrote:
> > "Xah Lee" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> (XL) wrote:
> >
> >XL> Joe: lang x is strongly typed
> >XL> Dave: you mean statically typed?
> >XL> John: no no, that's weakly typed.
>
> That should have been `weekly typed', according to the link below.
> Maybe there is also `daily typed' or `monthly typed'?
>
> >XL> http://xahlee.org/UnixResource_dir/writ/jargons.html

"""
If mathematicians are designing computer languages, they would probably just 
called such thing _pure functions_. The term conveys the meaning, without the 
“lamba” abstruseness.
"""

Proposing "jargon" to cure "jargon". Good job! Of course nothing will ever 
rival "jargonize", the crown jewl of all "jargon".

-- 
James Stroud
UCLA-DOE Institute for Genomics and Proteomics
Box 951570
Los Angeles, CA 90095

http://www.jamesstroud.com/
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Re: What are OOP's Jargons and Complexities?

[Piet van Oostrum]

> "Xah Lee" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> (XL) wrote:

>XL> Joe: lang x is strongly typed
>XL> Dave: you mean statically typed?
>XL> John: no no, that's weakly typed.

That should have been `weekly typed', according to the link below.
Maybe there is also `daily typed' or `monthly typed'?

>XL> http://xahlee.org/UnixResource_dir/writ/jargons.html

-- 
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URL: http://www.cs.uu.nl/~piet [PGP]
Private email: [EMAIL PROTECTED]
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Re: What are OOP's Jargons and Complexities?

[alex23]

Joe: So I gave my girlfriend some flowers.
Dave: What, like tulips?
John: No, no, he gave her roses.
Mike: Were they red roses?
Xah: You MORONS, they were JUST _flowers_! Enough with the mother
fucking jargon already!!

The moral of the story being that when you're not active in a specific
domain, the intricacies of it can easily look irrelevant to you.

-alex23

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RE: What are OOP's Jargons and Complexities?

[Tony Meyer]

[Paul Rubin]
> Strong typing means there [are] a lot of variables whose names
> are in ALL CAPS.

+1 QOTW.

=Tony.Meyer

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Re: What are OOP's Jargons and Complexities?

[Paul Rubin]

Roy Smith <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> writes:
> I used to have a bunch of comp sci questions I would ask interview victims.  
> One of them was "what does it mean when a language is strongly typed?"  I 
> once had somebody tell me it meant the language had long variable names, 
> and thus took a lot of typing.

But that's incorrect.  Strong typing means there's a lot of variables
whose names are in ALL CAPS.
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Re: What are OOP's Jargons and Complexities?

[Roy Smith]

"Xah Lee" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote:
> Joe: lang x is strongly typed
> Dave: you mean statically typed?
> John: no no, that's weakly typed.
> Mike: actually, it is dynamically typed!

I used to have a bunch of comp sci questions I would ask interview victims.  
One of them was "what does it mean when a language is strongly typed?"  I 
once had somebody tell me it meant the language had long variable names, 
and thus took a lot of typing.
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Re: What are OOP's Jargons and Complexities?

[Xah Lee]

Joe: lang x is strongly typed
Dave: you mean statically typed?
John: no no, that's weakly typed.
Mike: actually, it is dynamically typed!

rely on the morons of the IT industry, every mother fucking one of
them, to sing and propagate jargons.

See also:
http://xahlee.org/UnixResource_dir/writ/jargons.html

 Xah
 [EMAIL PROTECTED]
∑ http://xahlee.org/

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Re: What are OOP's Jargons and Complexities?

[Piet van Oostrum]

> "Tassilo v. Parseval" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> (TvP) wrote:

>TvP> Most often, languages with strong typing can be found on the functional
>TvP> front (such as ML and Haskell). These languages have a dynamic typing
>TvP> system. 

What do you mean with: 'Haskell has a dynamic typing system'?
-- 
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URL: http://www.cs.uu.nl/~piet [PGP]
Private email: [EMAIL PROTECTED]
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Re: What are OOP's Jargons and Complexities?

[John McGrath]

On 5/26/2005 at 3:11:44 AM, alex goldman wrote:

> What other meanings are there?

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Strongly_typed
http://c2.com/cgi/wiki?StronglyTyped

-- 
Regards,

John McGrath
-- 
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Re: What are OOP's Jargons and Complexities?

[Pascal Costanza]

alex goldman wrote:
> John McGrath wrote:
> 
>>Unfortunately, there is no
>>consensus as to what the term means.
> 
> If the language allows the programmer to write programs from the 'slack'
> domain, by saying "just trust me on this", then it's not strongly typed.
> 
> What other meanings are there? I wasn't aware of the lack of consensus.

There is a difference between getting a core dump when you invoke 
undefined behavior on some object, or just getting an exception. You can 
programmatically react to an exception to do something meaningful but 
not to a core dump. Some people use the term weak typing to refer to 
languages that potentially core dump whereas they use the term strong 
typing for languages that don't.


Pascal

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Re: What are OOP's Jargons and Complexities?

[alex goldman]

John McGrath wrote:

> Unfortunately, there is no
> consensus as to what the term means.

If the language allows the programmer to write programs from the 'slack'
domain, by saying "just trust me on this", then it's not strongly typed.

What other meanings are there? I wasn't aware of the lack of consensus.
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Re: What are OOP's Jargons and Complexities?

[David Formosa (aka ? the Platypus)]

On Tue, 24 May 2005 09:16:02 +0200, Tassilo v. Parseval
<[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote: 
> Also sprach John W. Kennedy:
[...]

> Most often, languages with strong typing can be found on the functional
> front (such as ML and Haskell). These languages have a dynamic typing
> system. I haven't yet come across a language that is both statically and
> strongly typed, in the strictest sense of the words. I wonder whether
> such a language would be usable at all.

Modula2 claims to be both statically typed and strongly typed.  And
your wonder at its usablity is justified.

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Re: What are OOP's Jargons and Complexities?

[Jürgen Exner]

Xah Lee wrote:
> The Rise of "Static" versus "Instance" variables

 Please do not feed the troll *

> --
> to be continued tomorrow.

Please don't

> This is part of an installment of the article
> "What are OOP's Jargons and Complexities"
> by Xah Lee, 20050128. The full text is at
>  http://[...]/Periodic_dosage_dir[...]

Didn't your doctor tell you that you have to take your dosage regularly?

> © Copyright 2005 by Xah Lee. Verbatim duplication of the complete
> article for non-profit purposes is granted.

Well, whatever he is missing, he has plenty of selfconfidence.

> The article is published in the following newsgroups:
> comp.lang.c,comp.lang.c++,comp.lang.lisp,comp.unix.programmer
> comp.lang.python,comp.lang.perl.misc,comp.lang.scheme,comp.lang.java.programmer
> comp.lang.functional,comp.object,comp.software-eng,comp.software.patterns

And guess what: that is called spamming.

jue 


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Re: What are OOP's Jargons and Complexities?

[Thomas G. Marshall]

Xah Lee coughed up:
> The Rise of "Static" versus "Instance" variables


You are clearly unable to form a proper argument, *AND* you have irritated 
nearly everyone frequently.



Ahthe blessed silence 


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Re: What are OOP's Jargons and Complexities?

[Thomas G. Marshall]

[EMAIL PROTECTED] coughed up:
> Thomas G. Marshall wrote:
>

*Missattributed* --Thomas G. Marshall (I) did /not/ write the following:

>>> I am not familiar with modern Fortran. Surely it at least has
>>> argument prototyping by now?
>
> Since the 1990 standard, if Fortran subroutines and functions are
> placed in MODULEs, or if INTERFACEs are provided, the compiler checks
> that procedures are called with the right types (int or float, scalar
> or array, etc.) of arguments.
>
>> There are some fortran advocates that pop into here now and again.
>> Frankly, I'm spooked by how far fortran seems to have come.  There
>> is even OO support now.  OI.
>
> Some Fortranners think the language has gotten too big and
> complicated, sounding a bit like C programmers complaining about C++
> (I don't mean that pejoratively).

There are old-poops in every discipline.  :)


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Existing file argument to non-existing argument.  And in fact, mv
itself is implemented as a link followed by an unlink.


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Re: What are OOP's Jargons and Complexities?

[John McGrath]

On 5/23/2005 at 7:54:24 PM, alex goldman wrote:

> I'm just curious, what do you mean by strong typing, and which strongly
> typed languages do you know?

"Strongly typed" is not a very useful term, unless your intent is to
generate confusion or start an argument.  Unfortunately, there is no
consensus as to what the term means.

-- 
Regards,

John McGrath
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Re: What are OOP's Jargons and Complexities?

[Ray Dillinger]

Wibble wrote:
> Thats how common lisp specifies a vector.
> 
> Andreas, your link indicates that lisp is a Weakly typed language not
> strong.  Theres no compile time type semantics, at least in CommonLisp,
> MacLisp, ZetaLisp or FranzLisp.
> 
> (setq foo #(1 2 3))
> (setq foo 1)
> (setq foo "Whatever")
> 
> 
> Theres no type associated with foo, only with what the variable is
> currently referencing.
> 
>  From your link:
>   When the types detected or declared are strictly enforced by the
>   language's semantics, the language is strongly-typed.
>   when the semantics of the language allows for inconsistencies between
>   the compile-time type and the run-time type, the language is
>   weakly-typed.


I think that such terms of art are sufficiently broad and
subject to interpretation that it is now necessary for each
researcher to say exactly what they mean by a claim placing
a language in a category. That definition must be taken
into account when interpreting the claims that particular
paper makes about those language categories.

That so many researchers have chosen to use the same terms
(static, dynamic, strongly, weakly ... ) to describe subtly
different things is distressing.

Bear





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Re: What are OOP's Jargons and Complexities?

[Xah Lee]

The Rise of “Static” versus “Instance” variables

In a normal programing language, variables inside functions are used by
the function, called local variables.

In OOP paradigm, as we've seen, super-subroutines (classes) are
assigned to variables (instantiation), and the inner-subroutines
(methods) are called thru the variables (objects). Because of this
mechanism, what's once known as local variables (class variables) can
now also be accessed thru the assigned variable (objet) by design. In
OOP parlance, this is to say that a class's variables can be accessed
thru the object reference, such as in myObject.data=4. For example:
mySurface = new a_surface();
mySurface.coordinatesList={...} // assign initial coordinates

However, sometimes a programmer only needs a collection of variables.
For exmple, a list of colors:
black = "#00";
gray = "#808080";
green = "#008000";

In pure OOP, data as these now come with a subroutine (class) wrapper:
class listOfColors() {
  black = "#00";
  gray = "#808080";
  green = "#008000";
}

Now to access these values, normally one needs to assign this
subroutine (class) to a variable (instantiation) as to create a object:
myColors = new listOfColors(); // instantiation! (creating a "object")
newColor = myColors.black;

As a workaround of this extraneous step is the birth of the concept of
“static” variables. (with the keyword “static” in Java) When a
variable is declared static, that variable can be accessed without
needing to instantiate its class. Example:
class listOfColors() {
  static black = "#00";
  static gray = "#808080";
  static green = "#008000";
}
newColor = listOfColors.black;   // no instantiation required

The issue of staticality is also applicable to inner-subroutines
(methods). For example, if you are writing a collection of math
functions such as Sine, Cosine, Tangent... etc, you don't really want
to create a instance in order to use. Example:
class mathFunctions() {
  static sin (x) {...}; // a static method
  ...
}
print mathFunctions.sin(1);  // no need to create object before use


The non-static variant of variables and methods are called “instance
variables” or “instance methods”, or collectively “instance
members”. Note that static members and instance members are very
different. With static members, variables and methods can be called
without creating a object. But more subtly, for a static variable,
there is just one copy of the variable; for instance variables, each
object maintains its own copy of the variable. A class can declare just
some variables static. So, when multiple objects are created from the
class, some variables will share values while others having independent
copies. For example:
class a_surface() {
  static pi; // a static variable
  coordinatesList;   // a instance variable
  ...
};
a_surface.pi=3.1415926;  // assign value of pi for all
a_surface objects
mySurface1 = new a_surface();
mySurface1.coordinatesList={...} // assign coordinates to one a_surface
object
mySurface2 = new a_surface();
mySurface2.coordinatesList={...} // assign coordinates to another
a_surface object

The issues of static versus instance members, is one complexity arising
out of OOP.

--
to be continued tomorrow.

This is part of an installment of the article
“What are OOP's Jargons and Complexities”
by Xah Lee, 20050128. The full text is at
 http://xahlee.org/Periodic_dosage_dir/t2/oop.html

© Copyright 2005 by Xah Lee. Verbatim duplication of the complete
article for non-profit purposes is granted.

The article is published in the following newsgroups:
comp.lang.c,comp.lang.c++,comp.lang.lisp,comp.unix.programmer
comp.lang.python,comp.lang.perl.misc,comp.lang.scheme,comp.lang.java.programmer
comp.lang.functional,comp.object,comp.software-eng,comp.software.patterns

 Xah
 [EMAIL PROTECTED]
∑ http://xahlee.org/

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Re: What are OOP's Jargons and Complexities?

[beliavsky]

Thomas G. Marshall wrote:

> > I am not familiar with modern Fortran. Surely it at least has argument
> > prototyping by now?

Since the 1990 standard, if Fortran subroutines and functions are
placed in MODULEs, or if INTERFACEs are provided, the compiler checks
that procedures are called with the right types (int or float, scalar
or array, etc.) of arguments.

> There are some fortran advocates that pop into here now and again.  Frankly,
> I'm spooked by how far fortran seems to have come.  There is even OO support
> now.  OI.

Some Fortranners think the language has gotten too big and complicated,
sounding a bit like C programmers complaining about C++ (I don't mean
that pejoratively).

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Re: What are OOP's Jargons and Complexities?

[Paul Rubin]

Wibble <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> writes:
> Andreas, your link indicates that lisp is a Weakly typed language not
> strong.  Theres no compile time type semantics, at least in CommonLisp,
> MacLisp, ZetaLisp or FranzLisp.

There are runtime semantics that enforce types.

>  From your link:
>When the types detected or declared are strictly enforced by the
>language's semantics, the language is strongly-typed.
>when the semantics of the language allows for inconsistencies between
>the compile-time type and the run-time type, the language is
>weakly-typed.

Yes, the compile-time type of 3 is integer, and the runtime type of 3
is also integer.  There is no inconsistency.  Compare that with C,
which lets you cast 3 to a pointer.
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Re: What are OOP's Jargons and Complexities?

[Wibble]

Thats how common lisp specifies a vector.

Andreas, your link indicates that lisp is a Weakly typed language not
strong.  Theres no compile time type semantics, at least in CommonLisp,
MacLisp, ZetaLisp or FranzLisp.

(setq foo #(1 2 3))
(setq foo 1)
(setq foo "Whatever")


Theres no type associated with foo, only with what the variable is
currently referencing.

 From your link:
   When the types detected or declared are strictly enforced by the
   language's semantics, the language is strongly-typed.
   when the semantics of the language allows for inconsistencies between
   the compile-time type and the run-time type, the language is
   weakly-typed.


Matthias Buelow wrote:
> Andreas Rottmann wrote:
> 
> 
>>You get terminology totally wrong here. As already said, Lisp is
>>stronger typed than C, but C is statically typed, whereas Lisp is
>>dynamically typed. In Lisp (or Scheme), all variables have types:
>>
>>(define foo #(1 2 3))
>>(vector? foo) => #t
>>(boolean? foo) => #t
> 
> 
> Hmm.. weird Scheme you're using here.
> Normally you have to quote the vector (see R5RS, 6.2.6) because it is
> not self-evaluating, and boolean? should not return true on vectors (6.3.1).
> 
> I get (on scheme48):
> 
> (define foo '#(1 2 3))
> (vector? foo)  => #t
> (boolean? foo) => #f
> 
> 
> mkb.
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Re: What are OOP's Jargons and Complexities?

[Matthias Buelow]

Andreas Rottmann wrote:

> You get terminology totally wrong here. As already said, Lisp is
> stronger typed than C, but C is statically typed, whereas Lisp is
> dynamically typed. In Lisp (or Scheme), all variables have types:
> 
> (define foo #(1 2 3))
> (vector? foo) => #t
> (boolean? foo) => #t

Hmm.. weird Scheme you're using here.
Normally you have to quote the vector (see R5RS, 6.2.6) because it is
not self-evaluating, and boolean? should not return true on vectors (6.3.1).

I get (on scheme48):

(define foo '#(1 2 3))
(vector? foo)  => #t
(boolean? foo) => #f


mkb.
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Re: What are OOP's Jargons and Complexities?

[Thomas G. Marshall]

John W. Kennedy coughed up:
> alex goldman wrote:
>> John W. Kennedy wrote:
>>
>>
>>> Strong
>>> typing has been a feature of mainstream programming languages since
>>> the late 1950's.
>>
>>
>> Is Fortran a strongly typed language? I don't think so. Strong
>> typing has been invented in the 70's, if I'm not mistaken, when ML
>> was invented, but strong typing has never been mainstream.
>
> I begin to believe that I have been reading naughty references, and
> that I should rather have said "statically typed".
>
> I am not familiar with modern Fortran. Surely it at least has argument
> prototyping by now?


There are some fortran advocates that pop into here now and again.  Frankly, 
I'm spooked by how far fortran seems to have come.  There is even OO support 
now.  OI.

I preferred the old days of thinking that fortran sucked "just 'cause".  :)


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Re: What are OOP's Jargons and Complexities?

[John W. Kennedy]

alex goldman wrote:
> John W. Kennedy wrote:
> 
> 
>>Strong
>>typing has been a feature of mainstream programming languages since the
>>late 1950's.
> 
> 
> Is Fortran a strongly typed language? I don't think so. Strong typing has
> been invented in the 70's, if I'm not mistaken, when ML was invented, but
> strong typing has never been mainstream.

I begin to believe that I have been reading naughty references, and that 
I should rather have said "statically typed".

I am not familiar with modern Fortran. Surely it at least has argument 
prototyping by now?

-- 
John W. Kennedy
"You can, if you wish, class all science-fiction together; but it is 
about as perceptive as classing the works of Ballantyne, Conrad and W. 
W. Jacobs together as the 'sea-story' and then criticizing _that_."
   -- C. S. Lewis.  "An Experiment in Criticism"
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Re: What are OOP's Jargons and Complexities?

[Andreas Rottmann]

Wibble <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> writes:

> Java or even C is more strongly typed than lisp or tcl which
> dont really have a concept of a typed variable.
> Lisp only does runtime type checking unless you do wierd
> unnatural things.
>
You get terminology totally wrong here. As already said, Lisp is
stronger typed than C, but C is statically typed, whereas Lisp is
dynamically typed. In Lisp (or Scheme), all variables have types:

(define foo #(1 2 3))
(vector? foo) => #t
(boolean? foo) => #t

See http://cliki.tunes.org/Type%20System.

Rotty
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PROTECTED]
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Re: What are OOP's Jargons and Complexities?

[Joe Smith]

Xah Lee wrote:

> The Rise of Classes, Methods, Objects

1) Most of the information you posted was incomplete and much of
it is just plain wrong.

2) What you posted was not perl related.

Are you deliberately trying to make yourself a laughingstock?
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Re: What are OOP's Jargons and Complexities?

[Tassilo v. Parseval]

Also sprach alex goldman:

> Tassilo v. Parseval wrote:

>> Most often, languages with strong typing can be found on the functional
>> front (such as ML and Haskell). These languages have a dynamic typing
>> system. 
>
> No, ML & Haskell are strongly and statically typed. Read this paper if
> interested:

You're right, their type system is in fact static. To me they never had
a very static feel though which is why I get their classification wrong
most of the time. LISP would have been an example for strongly and
dynamically typed.

Tassilo
-- 
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$m=-8,;;$_=$n&(0xff)<<$m,,$_>>=$m,,print+chr,,while(($m+=8)<=200);
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Re: What are OOP's Jargons and Complexities?

[alex goldman]

Tassilo v. Parseval wrote:

> Also sprach John W. Kennedy:
> 
>> alex goldman wrote:
>>> John W. Kennedy wrote:
>>> 
>>> 
Strong typing has been a feature of mainstream programming languages
since the late 1950's.
>>> 
>>> I'm just curious, what do you mean by /strong/ typing, and which
>>> strongly typed languages do you know?
>>
>> Unfortunately, I have seen the meaning shift with the context. In Ada
>> '83, it means it is not possible to have the equivalent of a C
>> unprototyped function, and that mixed-type expressions tend to need
>> explicit casting. In other contexts (as here), I've seen it used to mean
>> simply that variables have definite types, and it is not possible
>> (except by the use of polymorphic classes) for a variable to change from
>> an integer to a float to a character string in the course of execution.
>> In this sense, compile-to-machine-code languages (ee.g., Fortran, COBOL,
>> C, C++, or Pascal), are generally strongly typed
> 
> These are statically typed. The extent to which they are also strongly
> typed differs: C++ is probably a little more strongly typed than C, but
> by and large their typing is still fairly weak.
> 
> Most often, languages with strong typing can be found on the functional
> front (such as ML and Haskell). These languages have a dynamic typing
> system. 

No, ML & Haskell are strongly and statically typed. Read this paper if
interested:

http://research.microsoft.com/Users/luca/Papers/TypeSystems.pdf


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Re: What are OOP's Jargons and Complexities?

[Tassilo v. Parseval]

Also sprach John W. Kennedy:

> alex goldman wrote:
>> John W. Kennedy wrote:
>> 
>> 
>>>Strong typing has been a feature of mainstream programming languages
>>>since the late 1950's.
>> 
>> I'm just curious, what do you mean by /strong/ typing, and which strongly
>> typed languages do you know?
>
> Unfortunately, I have seen the meaning shift with the context. In Ada 
> '83, it means it is not possible to have the equivalent of a C 
> unprototyped function, and that mixed-type expressions tend to need 
> explicit casting. In other contexts (as here), I've seen it used to mean 
> simply that variables have definite types, and it is not possible 
> (except by the use of polymorphic classes) for a variable to change from 
> an integer to a float to a character string in the course of execution. 
> In this sense, compile-to-machine-code languages (ee.g., Fortran, COBOL, 
> C, C++, or Pascal), are generally strongly typed 

These are statically typed. The extent to which they are also strongly
typed differs: C++ is probably a little more strongly typed than C, but
by and large their typing is still fairly weak.

Most often, languages with strong typing can be found on the functional
front (such as ML and Haskell). These languages have a dynamic typing
system. I haven't yet come across a language that is both statically and
strongly typed, in the strictest sense of the words. I wonder whether
such a language would be usable at all.

Tassilo
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Re: What are OOP's Jargons and Complexities?

[alex goldman]

John W. Kennedy wrote:

> Strong
> typing has been a feature of mainstream programming languages since the
> late 1950's.

Is Fortran a strongly typed language? I don't think so. Strong typing has
been invented in the 70's, if I'm not mistaken, when ML was invented, but
strong typing has never been mainstream.
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Re: What are OOP's Jargons and Complexities?

[Mike Meyer]

Jonathan Bartlett <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> writes:

> Mike Meyer wrote:
> > "Xah Lee" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> writes:
> > So now we find out that Xah Lee is as ignorant of other programming
> > languages as he is of Python and Perl.
> 
> I think you're misreading some of what is being said.

Given how clear Lee's writing is, that's certainly possible.

I note that, while you disagree with my interpretation of what Lee said,
you trimmed the text under discussion in *every* case. That sort of makes
the discussion moot. I don't care enough about the subject to dig out his
original quotes. I do stand by my interpretation of them as radically wrong,
which is par for the course for Lee. If you really want to discuss these,
please repost your comments, leaving Lee's text in place.

> > Function nesting and classes were viewed as independent
> > features. Some OO languages support nesting, others don't. I think
> > it was Grace Murray
> > Hopper commenting on Ada who said that "With classes, nesting is for the
> > birds."
> Doesn't this quote show the opposite?

I don't think so. I had originally written a comment to the effect that
early OO languages seemed to include it or not, with no apparent rhyme
or reason. The GMH quote was meant to show that nesting - or lack of it -
was pretty much irrelevant. I left out the intervening text.

My bad.

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Re: What are OOP's Jargons and Complexities?

[Wibble]

Java or even C is more strongly typed than lisp or tcl which
dont really have a concept of a typed variable.
Lisp only does runtime type checking unless you do wierd
unnatural things.

I suppose ADA or Eiffel might have stronger typing than
java, but I dont know those languages.

I guess strong is relative.

alex goldman wrote:
> John W. Kennedy wrote:
> 
> 
>>Strong
>>typing has been a feature of mainstream programming languages since the
>>late 1950's.
> 
> 
> I'm just curious, what do you mean by /strong/ typing, and which strongly
> typed languages do you know?
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Re: What are OOP's Jargons and Complexities?

[John W. Kennedy]

alex goldman wrote:
> John W. Kennedy wrote:
> 
> 
>>Strong
>>typing has been a feature of mainstream programming languages since the
>>late 1950's.
> 
> 
> I'm just curious, what do you mean by /strong/ typing, and which strongly
> typed languages do you know?

Unfortunately, I have seen the meaning shift with the context. In Ada 
'83, it means it is not possible to have the equivalent of a C 
unprototyped function, and that mixed-type expressions tend to need 
explicit casting. In other contexts (as here), I've seen it used to mean 
simply that variables have definite types, and it is not possible 
(except by the use of polymorphic classes) for a variable to change from 
an integer to a float to a character string in the course of execution. 
In this sense, compile-to-machine-code languages (ee.g., Fortran, COBOL, 
C, C++, or Pascal), are generally strongly typed and interpreted 
languages (ee.g., shell scripts, Perl, REXX, APL, or LISP) are generally 
not. (In pure OO languages, such as SmallTalk or Ruby, the distinction 
may not really apply, since all variables are of the single type 
reference-to-root-class.)

-- 
John W. Kennedy
"The bright critics assembled in this volume will doubtless show, in 
their sophisticated and ingenious new ways, that, just as /Pooh/ is 
suffused with humanism, our humanism itself, at this late date, has 
become full of /Pooh./"
   -- Frederick Crews.  "Postmodern Pooh", Preface
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Re: What are OOP's Jargons and Complexities?

[alex goldman]

John W. Kennedy wrote:

> Strong
> typing has been a feature of mainstream programming languages since the
> late 1950's.

I'm just curious, what do you mean by /strong/ typing, and which strongly
typed languages do you know?
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Re: What are OOP's Jargons and Complexities?

[John Bokma]

John W. Kennedy wrote:

> inescapable necessity for compiling to efficient object code. Strong 
> typing has been a feature of mainstream programming languages since the 
> late 1950's.

Give Lee another century and he will get there, hopefully :-D.

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Re: What are OOP's Jargons and Complexities?

[John W. Kennedy]

Xah Lee wrote:
> So, a simple code like this in normal languages:
> a = "a string";
> b = "another one";
> c = join(a,b);
> print c;
> 
> or in lisp style
> (set a "a string")
> (set b "another one")
> (set c (join a b))
> (print c)
> 
> becomes in pure OOP languages:
> public class test {
>   public static void main(String[] args) {
> String a = new String("a string");
> String b = new String("another one");
> StringBuffer c = new StringBuffer(40);
> c.append(a); c.append(b);
> System.out.println(c.toString());
> }
> }

The actual Java parallel to what you have written above is:

 String a = "a string";
 String b = "another one";
 String c = a + b;
 System.out.println (c);

> In the same way, numbers in Java have become a formalization of many
> classes: Double, Float, Integer, Long... and each has a bunch of
> "methods" to operate or convert from one to the other.

Byte, Short, Integer, Long, Char, Float and Double are wrapper classes, 
which exist chiefly to allow primitive content to be stored in 
collection classes.

byte, short, int, long, char, float, and double are primitives.

> Instead of
> aNumber = 3;
> print aNumber^3;
> 
> In Java the programer needs to master the ins and outs of the several
> number classes, and decide which one to use. (and if a program later
> needs to change from one type of number to another, it is often
> cumbersome.)

This has nothing to do with object orientation or classes, but with 
strong typing, which is important for program verification, and an 
inescapable necessity for compiling to efficient object code. Strong 
typing has been a feature of mainstream programming languages since the 
late 1950's.

-- 
John W. Kennedy
"The bright critics assembled in this volume will doubtless show, in 
their sophisticated and ingenious new ways, that, just as /Pooh/ is 
suffused with humanism, our humanism itself, at this late date, has 
become full of /Pooh./"
   -- Frederick Crews.  "Postmodern Pooh", Preface
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Re: What are OOP's Jargons and Complexities?

[Kay Schluehr]

Xah Lee wrote:

> As part of this new syntax and purity, where everything in a program
is
> of Classes and Objects and Methods, many complex issues and concept
> have arisen in OOP.

Yes and it is easy to communicate a class which represents some thing
determined by object oriented analysis and can be graphed as an element
of an UML diagram in your development team. This is simply the state of
the art in the IT industry and if FP-people or followers of any other
alternative programming style can communicate their concepts and design
patterns via type-classes or parentheses as well or better than they
will going to lead the dicourse and OO will fall apart. I'm just
sceptical that this is going to happen.

Kay

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Re: What are OOP's Jargons and Complexities?

[Erik Max Francis]

Jonathan Bartlett wrote:

> I think you're misreading some of what is being said.

I think you're giving the author too much credit.

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Re: What are OOP's Jargons and Complexities?

[Peter Dembinski]

"Xah Lee" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> writes:

[snap]

put it on your blog

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Re: What are OOP's Jargons and Complexities?

[Thomas G. Marshall]

Paul McGuire coughed up:
> Is this supposed to be some sort of wake-up call or call-to-arms to
> all the CS lemmings who have been hoodwinked by Sun into the realm of
> jargon over substance?

...[rip]...

> You certainly seem to have a lot of energy and enthusiasm for these
> topics.  It would be nice if you could find a way to illuminate and
> educate, without falling prey to the urge to pontificate.  If you
> really have some points to make, put away the breathless and profane
> debate style - it just gets in the way of anything you're trying to
> say.  Really, we are *mostly* adults here, and can make up our own
> minds on most things.


Of the many things that bother me about his post is his tendency to voice 
his conclusions as if they would be universally arrived at given his data. 
{shrug}  Paying attention to this guy's post has proven to be a complete 
WOT.


-- 
I've seen this a few times--Don't make this mistake:

Dwight: "This thing is wildly available."
Smedly: "Did you mean wildly, or /widely/ ?"
Dwight: "Both!", said while nodding emphatically.

Dwight was exposed to have made a grammatical
error and tries to cover it up by thinking
fast.  This is so painfully obvious that he
only succeeds in looking worse.


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Re: What are OOP's Jargons and Complexities?

[Paul McGuire]

Is this supposed to be some sort of wake-up call or call-to-arms to all
the CS lemmings who have been hoodwinked by Sun into the realm of
jargon over substance?

Please do some informed research and homework before spouting off with
such blather.  Sun Microsystems is hardly The Great Satan of OOP,
trying to foist object-speak on the rest of humanity.  The object
concepts of classes, methods, instances, inheritance, polymorphism,
etc. were already well on their way into the CS consciousness before
Java came on the scene.  To attempt to relate the emergence of object
concepts as starting with Java simply illustrates a lack of historical
awareness.  To omit so obvious a Java precursor as Smalltalk seriously
undermines any authority you may have once had on this topic.

It is easy to attack "terminology" as "jargon," but in fact, precise
definitions of terms help improve communication of complex concepts.
Unfortunately, some of the concepts *are* complex - we just recently on
this forum had someone ask about "polymorphism" when what they really
meant was "overloaded method signatures."  (It is even more unfortunate
that language features such as overloaded method signatures and
operator overloading get equated with OOP, simply because OO language
XYZ supports them.)  I would say that terminology becomes jargon when
it introduces new terms that do not really help describe any new
concepts, but simply raise an arbitrary barrier to new students of the
field.  And *any* complex field's terminology will be perceived as
jargon to those who have not done adequate study - are you about to
begin a parallel crusade to attack the jargon-spewing conspiracy among
quantum physicists, what with their terms of top, down, spin, charm,
muon, meson, lepton, etc.?

Your complaint about Java requiring all code to reside in a class is
not new.  It is a common newbie issue that one has to get past "static
void main(string[] args)" just to do a simple "Hello, World!".  But
this seems to be a minor point for someone as authoritative as yourself
to waste over 1000 words on.  All computing languages have good and bad
features.  Determining whether Java's "classes-only" language design is
"good" or "bad" is something of a point of view - let it go that some
folks find it overly purist and a nuisance, while others like the
uniformity of implementation.

You certainly seem to have a lot of energy and enthusiasm for these
topics.  It would be nice if you could find a way to illuminate and
educate, without falling prey to the urge to pontificate.  If you
really have some points to make, put away the breathless and profane
debate style - it just gets in the way of anything you're trying to
say.  Really, we are *mostly* adults here, and can make up our own
minds on most things.

-- Paul

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Re: What are OOP's Jargons and Complexities?

[Jonathan Bartlett]

Mike Meyer wrote:
> "Xah Lee" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> writes:
> 
> So now we find out that Xah Lee is as ignorant of other programming
> languages as he is of Python and Perl.

I think you're misreading some of what is being said.

> Nested subroutines date back to Algol, which was first specified in
> the 50s.

I think the author was speaking in terms of how high a level of a 
language it is, not necessarily how recent it is.

> Actually, classes and other OO concepts come out of simulation programming,
> not as an outgrowth of nested functions. Most of the features one
> associates with OO languages were present in Simula.

Again, I think the author was pointing out that it is an outgrowth 
logically, not necessarily historically.  There is a basic equivalence 
between a class and a group of functions closed over the same variables. 
  I mention something similar in an IBM DeveloperWorks article here:

http://www.ibm.com/developerworks/linux/library/l-highfunc.html

> Function nesting and classes were viewed as independent features. Some 
> OO languages support nesting, others don't. I think it was Grace Murray
> Hopper commenting on Ada who said that "With classes, nesting is for the
> birds."

Doesn't this quote show the opposite?

> Strictly speaking, this isn't true of *any* language. Even the most
> fanatical of languages distinguish between classes, objects and
> methods.

I think the point was that in Java everything is done within the context 
of a class.  You can define methods, but only as a part of a class.  You 
cannot define a function or even a variable that stands on its own.

> But IIRC, Java comes with a set of low-level types that don't have
> classes associated with them.

But still, it does not allow you, the programmer, to do the same.

Jon

Learn to program using Linux assembly language
http://www.cafeshops.com/bartlettpublish.8640017
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Re: What are OOP's Jargons and Complexities?

[Mike Meyer]

"Xah Lee" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> writes:

So now we find out that Xah Lee is as ignorant of other programming
languages as he is of Python and Perl.

> In advanced languages such as LISP family, it is not uncommon to define
> functions inside a function. For example:
> subroutine f (x1, x2, ...) {
>   variables...
>   subroutine f1 (x1...) {...}
>   subroutine f2 (x1...) {...}
> }

Nested subroutines date back to Algol, which was first specified in
the 50s.

> So now, a_surface is no longer viewed as a subroutine, but a boxed set
> of things centered around a piece of data. All functions that work on
> the data are included in the boxed set. This paradigm possible in
> functional languages has refined so much so that it spread to other
> groups and became known as Object Oriented Programing, and complete
> languages with new syntax catered to such scheme emerged.

Actually, classes and other OO concepts come out of simulation programming,
not as an outgrowth of nested functions. Most of the features one
associates with OO languages were present in Simula.

Function nesting and classes were viewed as independent features. Some 
OO languages support nesting, others don't. I think it was Grace Murray
Hopper commenting on Ada who said that "With classes, nesting is for the
birds."

> This style of programing and language have become so fanatical that in
> such dedicated languages like Java, everything in the language are
> “Classes”.

Strictly speaking, this isn't true of *any* language. Even the most
fanatical of languages distinguish between classes, objects and
methods.

But IIRC, Java comes with a set of low-level types that don't have
classes associated with them.

> This Object Oriented Programing style and dedicated languages (such as
> C++, Java)

This is pretty sloppy english. You imply that C++, like Java, is pure OO
language - meaning that there are no freestanding functions or variables.
That's false.

> have become a fad like wild fire among the programing mass
> of ignoramuses in the industry. Partly because of the data-centric new
> perspective, partly because the novelty and mysticism of new syntax and
> jargonization.

Actually, C++ became popular because it promised access to the power of
OO programming while leveraging the programmers familiarity with C. In
reality, it combined the worst features of both. Java became popular
because it fixed some of the problems with C++ while leveraging
programmers familiarity with C++ and promising "run anywhere" capability.

Personally, I think that these two languages are good examples of
someones ability to design a popular language being much better than
their ability to design a good language. But that's a matter of opinion,
and as such is debatable.

> It is especially hyped by the opportunist Sun Microsystems with the
> inception of Java, internet, and web applications booms around 1995. At
> those times, OOP (and Java) were thought to revolutionize the industry
> and solve all software engineering problems, in particular by certain
> "reuse of components" concept that was thought to come with OOP.

At that time, OOP was pushing 30 years old. Some people were using it
and getting that component reuse that it promised. Others were using
it and discovering that designing reusable classes is *hard*. It was
clear to pretty much everyone that OOP wasn't a silver bullet.

> We now know that the jargon Class is originally and effectively just a
> boxed set of data and subroutines, all defined inside a subroutine. And
> the jargon "Object" is just a variable that has been set to this super
> subroutine. And the inner subroutines are what's called Methods.

This is simply ludicruously wrong.

> to be continued tomorrow.

Please don't waste our time.

  http://www.mired.org/home/mwm/
Independent WWW/Perforce/FreeBSD/Unix consultant, email for more information.
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Re: What are OOP's Jargons and Complexities?

[Wibble]

You're point being...?

I'm an old lisp hacker too, and lisp developed
objects too, because they're cool and useful (Flavors & CLOS).

Java has inner classes also, and nobody misses FLET & LABELS.

Limiting responsiblity and enhanced type safety, as well as
improved readablity are a win hands down over the bad old
days.

Lisp is not a more advanced language than Java.  Its 30+
years older and shows it in alot places.  Lisp has some
things I wish were in Java but the corralary holds true.

Object orient programming in Lisp is nice too.

Xah Lee wrote:
> What are OOP's Jargons and Complexities
> Xah Lee, 20050128
> 
> The Rise of Classes, Methods, Objects
> 
> In computer languages, often a function definition looks like this:
> subroutine f (x1, x2, ...) {
>   variables ...
>   do this or that
> }
> 
> In advanced languages such as LISP family, it is not uncommon to define
> functions inside a function. For example:
> subroutine f (x1, x2, ...) {
>   variables...
>   subroutine f1 (x1...) {...}
>   subroutine f2 (x1...) {...}
> }
> 
> Often these f1 f2 inner functions are used inside f, and are not
> relevant outside of f. Such power of the language gradually developed
> into a style of programing. For example:
> subroutine a_surface () {
>   coordinatesList = ...;
>   subroutine translate (distance) {...}
>   subroutine rotate (angle) {..}
> }
> 
> Such a style is that the a_surface is no longer viewed as a function.
> But instead, a boxed set of functions, centered around a piece of data.
> And, all functions for manipulating this piece of data are all embodied
> in this function. For example:
> subroutine a_surface (arg) {
>   coordinatesList = ...
>   subroutine translate (distance) {set coordinatesList to translated
> version}
>   subroutine rotate (angle) {set coordinatesList to rotated version}
>   subroutine return () {return coordinatesList}
> 
>   if (no arg) {return coordinatesList}
> else { apply arg to coordinatesList }
> }
> 
> In this way, one uses a_surface as a data, which comes with its owe set
> of functions:
> mySurface = a_surface();
> mySurface(rotate(angle));// now the surface data has been
> rotated
> mySurface(translate(distance));  // now its translated
> newSurface = mySurface(return())
> 
> So now, a_surface is no longer viewed as a subroutine, but a boxed set
> of things centered around a piece of data. All functions that work on
> the data are included in the boxed set. This paradigm possible in
> functional languages has refined so much so that it spread to other
> groups and became known as Object Oriented Programing, and complete
> languages with new syntax catered to such scheme emerged.
> 
> In such languages, instead of writing them like this:
> mySurface = a_surface();
> mySurface(rotate(angle));
> 
> the syntax is changed to like this, for example:
> mySurface = new a_surface();
> mySurfaceRotated = mySurface.rotate(angle);
> 
> In such languages, the super subroutine a_surface is no longer called a
> function or subroutine. It is now called a “Class”. And now the
> variable holding the function "mySurface = a_surface()" is now called a
> “Object”. Subroutines inside the function a_surface() are no longer
> called inner-subroutines. They are called “Methods”. The act of
> assigning a super-subroutine to a variable is called instantiation.
> 
> This style of programing and language have become so fanatical that in
> such dedicated languages like Java, everything in the language are
> “Classes”. One can no longer just define a variable or subroutine.
> Instead, one creates these meta-subroutine “Classes”. Everything
> one do are inside Classes. And one assign Classes inside these Classes
> to create “Objects”. And one uses “Methods” to manipulate
> Objects. In this fashion, even basic primitives like numbers, strings,
> and lists are no longer atomic entities. They are now Classes.
> 
> For example, in Java, a string is a class String. And inside the class
> String, there are Methods to manipulate strings, such as finding the
> number of chars, or extracting parts of the string. This can get very
> complicated. For example, in Java, there are actually two Classes of
> strings: One is String, and the other is StringBuffer. Which one to use
> depends on whether you intend to change the data.
> 
> So, a simple code like this in normal languages:
> a = "a string";
> b = "another one";
> c = join(a,b);
> print c;
> 
> or in lisp style
> (set a "a string")
> (set b "another one")
> (set c (join a b))
> (print c)
> 
> becomes in pure OOP languages:
> public class test {
>   public st

What are OOP's Jargons and Complexities?

[Xah Lee]

What are OOP's Jargons and Complexities
Xah Lee, 20050128

The Rise of Classes, Methods, Objects

In computer languages, often a function definition looks like this:
subroutine f (x1, x2, ...) {
  variables ...
  do this or that
}

In advanced languages such as LISP family, it is not uncommon to define
functions inside a function. For example:
subroutine f (x1, x2, ...) {
  variables...
  subroutine f1 (x1...) {...}
  subroutine f2 (x1...) {...}
}

Often these f1 f2 inner functions are used inside f, and are not
relevant outside of f. Such power of the language gradually developed
into a style of programing. For example:
subroutine a_surface () {
  coordinatesList = ...;
  subroutine translate (distance) {...}
  subroutine rotate (angle) {..}
}

Such a style is that the a_surface is no longer viewed as a function.
But instead, a boxed set of functions, centered around a piece of data.
And, all functions for manipulating this piece of data are all embodied
in this function. For example:
subroutine a_surface (arg) {
  coordinatesList = ...
  subroutine translate (distance) {set coordinatesList to translated
version}
  subroutine rotate (angle) {set coordinatesList to rotated version}
  subroutine return () {return coordinatesList}

  if (no arg) {return coordinatesList}
else { apply arg to coordinatesList }
}

In this way, one uses a_surface as a data, which comes with its owe set
of functions:
mySurface = a_surface();
mySurface(rotate(angle));// now the surface data has been
rotated
mySurface(translate(distance));  // now its translated
newSurface = mySurface(return())

So now, a_surface is no longer viewed as a subroutine, but a boxed set
of things centered around a piece of data. All functions that work on
the data are included in the boxed set. This paradigm possible in
functional languages has refined so much so that it spread to other
groups and became known as Object Oriented Programing, and complete
languages with new syntax catered to such scheme emerged.

In such languages, instead of writing them like this:
mySurface = a_surface();
mySurface(rotate(angle));

the syntax is changed to like this, for example:
mySurface = new a_surface();
mySurfaceRotated = mySurface.rotate(angle);

In such languages, the super subroutine a_surface is no longer called a
function or subroutine. It is now called a “Class”. And now the
variable holding the function "mySurface = a_surface()" is now called a
“Object”. Subroutines inside the function a_surface() are no longer
called inner-subroutines. They are called “Methods”. The act of
assigning a super-subroutine to a variable is called instantiation.

This style of programing and language have become so fanatical that in
such dedicated languages like Java, everything in the language are
“Classes”. One can no longer just define a variable or subroutine.
Instead, one creates these meta-subroutine “Classes”. Everything
one do are inside Classes. And one assign Classes inside these Classes
to create “Objects”. And one uses “Methods” to manipulate
Objects. In this fashion, even basic primitives like numbers, strings,
and lists are no longer atomic entities. They are now Classes.

For example, in Java, a string is a class String. And inside the class
String, there are Methods to manipulate strings, such as finding the
number of chars, or extracting parts of the string. This can get very
complicated. For example, in Java, there are actually two Classes of
strings: One is String, and the other is StringBuffer. Which one to use
depends on whether you intend to change the data.

So, a simple code like this in normal languages:
a = "a string";
b = "another one";
c = join(a,b);
print c;

or in lisp style
(set a "a string")
(set b "another one")
(set c (join a b))
(print c)

becomes in pure OOP languages:
public class test {
  public static void main(String[] args) {
String a = new String("a string");
String b = new String("another one");
StringBuffer c = new StringBuffer(40);
c.append(a); c.append(b);
System.out.println(c.toString());
}
}

Here, the "new String" creates a String object. The "new
StringBuffer(40)" creates the changeable string object StringBuffer,
with room for 40 chars. "append" is a method of StringBuffer. It is
used to join two Strings.

Notice the syntax "c.append(a)", which we can view it as calling a
inner subroutine "append", on a super subroutine that has been assigned
to c, where, the inner subroutine modifies the inner data by appending
a to it.

And in the above Java example, StringBuffer class has another method
"toString()" used to convert this into a String Class, necessary
because System.out.println's parameter requires a String type, not
StringBuffer.

For a example of the complexity of classes and methods, see the Java
documentation for the StringBuffer class at
http://jav

What are OOP's Jargons and Complexities?

[Xah Lee]

What are OOP's Jargons and Complexities
Xah Lee, 20050128

The Rise of Classes, Methods, Objects

In computer languages, often a function definition looks like this:
subroutine f (x1, x2, ...) {
  variables ...
  do this or that
}

In advanced languages such as LISP family, it is not uncommon to define
functions inside a function. For example:
subroutine f (x1, x2, ...) {
  variables...
  subroutine f1 (x1...) {...}
  subroutine f2 (x1...) {...}
}

Often these f1 f2 inner functions are used inside f, and are not
relevant outside of f. Such power of the language gradually developed
into a style of programing. For example:
subroutine a_surface () {
  coordinatesList = ...;
  subroutine translate (distance) {...}
  subroutine rotate (angle) {..}
}

Such a style is that the a_surface is no longer viewed as a function.
But instead, a boxed set of functions, centered around a piece of data.
And, all functions for manipulating this piece of data are all embodied
in this function. For example:
subroutine a_surface (arg) {
  coordinatesList = ...
  subroutine translate (distance) {set coordinatesList to translated
version}
  subroutine rotate (angle) {set coordinatesList to rotated version}
  subroutine return () {return coordinatesList}

  if (no arg) {return coordinatesList}
else { apply arg to coordinatesList }
}

In this way, one uses a_surface as a data, which comes with its owe set
of functions:
mySurface = a_surface();
mySurface(rotate(angle));// now the surface data has been
rotated
mySurface(translate(distance));  // now its translated
newSurface = mySurface(return())

So now, a_surface is no longer viewed as a subroutine, but a boxed set
of things centered around a piece of data. All functions that work on
the data are included in the boxed set. This paradigm possible in
functional languages has refined so much so that it spread to other
groups and became known as Object Oriented Programing, and complete
languages with new syntax catered to such scheme emerged.

In such languages, instead of writing them like this:
mySurface = a_surface();
mySurface(rotate(angle));

the syntax is changed to like this, for example:
mySurface = new a_surface();
mySurfaceRotated = mySurface.rotate(angle);

In such languages, the super subroutine a_surface is no longer called a
function or subroutine. It is now called a “Class”. And now the
variable holding the function "mySurface = a_surface()" is now called a
“Object”. Subroutines inside the function a_surface() are no longer
called inner-subroutines. They are called “Methods”. The act of
assigning a super-subroutine to a variable is called instantiation.

This style of programing and language have become so fanatical that in
such dedicated languages like Java, everything in the language are
“Classes”. One can no longer just define a variable or subroutine.
Instead, one creates these meta-subroutine “Classes”. Everything
one do are inside Classes. And one assign Classes inside these Classes
to create “Objects”. And one uses “Methods” to manipulate
Objects. In this fashion, even basic primitives like numbers, strings,
and lists are no longer atomic entities. They are now Classes.

For example, in Java, a string is a class String. And inside the class
String, there are Methods to manipulate strings, such as finding the
number of chars, or extracting parts of the string. This can get very
complicated. For example, in Java, there are actually two Classes of
strings: One is String, and the other is StringBuffer. Which one to use
depends on whether you intend to change the data.

So, a simple code like this in normal languages:
a = "a string";
b = "another one";
c = join(a,b);
print c;

or in lisp style
(set a "a string")
(set b "another one")
(set c (join a b))
(print c)

becomes in pure OOP languages:
public class test {
  public static void main(String[] args) {
String a = new String("a string");
String b = new String("another one");
StringBuffer c = new StringBuffer(40);
c.append(a); c.append(b);
System.out.println(c.toString());
}
}

Here, the "new String" creates a String object. The "new
StringBuffer(40)" creates the changeable string object StringBuffer,
with room for 40 chars. "append" is a method of StringBuffer. It is
used to join two Strings.

Notice the syntax "c.append(a)", which we can view it as calling a
inner subroutine "append", on a super subroutine that has been assigned
to c, where, the inner subroutine modifies the inner data by appending
a to it.

And in the above Java example, StringBuffer class has another method
"toString()" used to convert this into a String Class, necessary
because System.out.println's parameter requires a String type, not
StringBuffer.

For a example of the complexity of classes and methods, see the Java
documentation for the StringBuffer class at
http://jav