NetNews Offline 2/NetNews Offline Volume 2.iso/news/comp/std/c/701

Internet Message Format | 1996-08-06 | 1.7 KB

Path: lyra.csx.cam.ac.uk!nmm1
From: [e-mail] (Nick Maclaren)
Newsgroups: comp.std.c
Subject: Re: EXIT_SUCCES != EXIT_FAILURE?
Date: 5 Apr 1996 19:40:52 GMT
Organization: University of Cambridge, England
Message-ID: <4k3t04$[e-mail]>
References: <tompa.827763954@news> <4j7p4p$[e-mail]>  <4jdr0l$[e-mail]> <[e-mail]>
NNTP-Posting-Host: ursa.cus.cam.ac.uk

In article <[e-mail]>, [e-mail] (J. Kanze) writes:
|> In article <4jdr0l$[e-mail]> [e-mail] (Nick
|> Maclaren) writes:
|>
|>     [...]
|> |> To put things in context, do you expect all students to write code
|> |> assuming the compilation and execution environments differ in their
|> |> character sets and both fixed- and floating-point arithmetic?
|>
|> Yes.  Can you show me an example of good coding practice where this
|> would make a difference?  (And if your not teaching your students good
|> coding practice, you shouldn't be teaching them, period.)

Try using complex text handling, manipulating externally-defined
data structures, writing special function libraries or using
radically different systems for the different translation phases.
I agree that these tasks are way beyond the ability of most students
(and even most experienced programmers).

Actually, have you ever pre-processed the code of a compiler on an
ASCII machine for compilation on an EBCDIC one, or vice versa?  I
suspect that you underestimate the difficulties.


Nick Maclaren,
University of Cambridge Computer Laboratory,
New Museums Site, Pembroke Street, Cambridge CB2 3QG, England.
Email:  [e-mail]
Tel.:  [phone]    Fax:  [phone]