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- Newsgroups: comp.os.vms
- Path: sparky!uunet!eco.twg.com!eco.twg.com!larry
- From: larry@eco.twg.com (Lawrence B. Henry III)
- Subject: re: VAX c
- Message-ID: <1993Jan4.194124.25076@eco.twg.com>
- Lines: 38
- Sender: larry@vishnu.eco.twg.com (Lawrence B. Henry III)
- Nntp-Posting-Host: eco.twg.com
- Reply-To: larry@eco.twg.com
- Organization: The Wollongong Group (East Coast Operations)
- References: <9212282111.AA11260@uu3.psi.com> <1hs23kINNnqs@gap.caltech.edu> <4JAN199309361642@jhuvms.hcf.jhu.edu>
- Date: Mon, 4 Jan 93 19:41:24 GMT
- Lines: 38
-
-
- In article <4JAN199309361642@jhuvms.hcf.jhu.edu>, ecf_stbo@jhuvms.hcf.jhu.edu (Remember Grimalkin) writes:
- |>In article <1hs23kINNnqs@gap.caltech.edu>, carl@SOL1.GPS.CALTECH.EDU writes...
- |>>Gawd, how I *HATE* UNIX!
- |>
- |>But you use C?
- |>
- |>This discussion just reinforces my belief that C is an unacceptable language
- |>because the run time library has to emulate unix, regardless of the OS. I
- |>have seen C take over as 'this weeks language' and I just don't understand it.
- |>Why in hell are so many people using C on VMS? Why would you want to hose your
- |>performance running through 14 levels of emulation attempting to (and often
- |>failing) make the rtl conform to every little idiosyncrasy of one particular
- |>system? I mean, is it a management decree based on 'marketing related
- |>concerns'? Is it for 'portability' (seems like the typical C program depends on
- |>such exact unix behavior that this portability is just a myth touted by people
- |>running unix. Christ, look at the contortions the guy who ported XV had to go
- |>through)?
- |>
- |> stuff omitted.
- |>
- |>Tom O'Toole - ecf_stbo@jhuvms.hcf.jhu.edu - JHUVMS system programmer
- |>Homewood Computing Facilities, Johns Hopkins University, Balto. Md. 21218
-
- Tom,
- I have to agree.. for some reason the system calls of the UNIX OS
- have become intrinsically bound to the C language in a way that was never
- intended [this is probably largely due to the fact that most C code has
- traditionally evolved from a UNIX platform, and therefore for portablility
- (this is btw why POSIX came to be) reasons vendors mimic'd the system calls].
- Don't blame this on C ! It is an excellent systems level programming
- language.. Most of the code that I write in C is never even linked to a RTL..
- Unfortunately when DEC introduced VAX C, the RTL was not as well thought out
- as it should have been and therefore abomination.. fortunately,
- we now have DEC C.. this has tremendous promise as an excellent implementation
- of C where the policies don't get confused with the implementation details.
-
- -Larry.
-