[Info-vax] PostgreSQL (Re: open source OpenVMS (Re: Oracle-RDB seminar notes))

[Hans Vlems]

On 5 apr, 01:32, Simon Clubley <clubley at remove_me.eisner.decus.org-
Earth.UFP> wrote:
> On 2013-04-04, David Froble <da... at tsoft-inc.com> wrote:
>
>
>
> > The same thing happens with C.  I don't know why.  I've tried.  It just
> > doesn't make sense to me.  I'm not going to blame the language.  I've
> > never been able to acquire another language besides English either.  I
> > know I have these problems.  I'm the problem.  Doesn't make it any less
> > of a problem.
>
> What (computer) languages do you know ?
>
> Have you ever tried to learn Pascal or a similar styled language ?
> The way you do things in those languages is rather different from the way
> you do things in C.
>
> I can and do write code in C and other C style languages just fine; but
> at the same time I do like the language syntax and semantics found in
> languages like Pascal and other Wirth style languages.
>
> The Wikipedia page in case you are unfamiliar with Pascal:
>
> http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pascal_%28programming_language%29
>
> There are some code examples about half way down the page.
>
> Simon.
>
> --
> Simon Clubley, clubley at remove_me.eisner.decus.org-Earth.UFP
> Microsoft: Bringing you 1980s technology to a 21st century world

C in many ways is a strange world when you've learned to program in
Algol,
especially so in a Dijkstra-oriented world like I did. Burroughs
Extended Algol is a versatile
programming language and (with minor additions) suited to build an OS
in (the
Burroughs MCP).
Next I learned (and used) COBOL, Fortran IV, Pascal and PL/I.
PL/I is not an easy language and perhaps that's why it never became as
popular as COBOL.
Pascal is Algol with a lot of syntactical baggage added and without
call-by-name. Only Simula
does that IIRC. I like the way Algol declares variables: 'integer' i;
And Wirth's way i : integer;
is to my eyes cumbersome. I must add that if I use the term Algol I
always think of Burroughs
Extended Algol, which is not a fair comparison.
Basically when I look at these new languages the motto in the original
Algol60 specification
springs to mind:
Was sich überhaupt sagen läßt, läßt sich
klar sagen; und wovon man nicht reden
kann, darüber muß man schweigen.
 Ludwig Wittgenstein

Hans