[Info-vax] Long uptime cut short by Hurricane Sandy

[Johnny Billquist]

On 2013-02-01 14:10, Bill Gunshannon wrote:
> In article <kegdvc$fgc$1 at iltempo.update.uu.se>,
> 	Johnny Billquist <bqt at softjar.se> writes:

[... about languages that can do string subtraction... ]

>> SNOBOL to start with.
>> I need to check, but I think both perl and python might as well. Trying
>> to remember what other languages I've used which have strings as a
>> rather basic data type...
>>
>
> I said real programming languages.  :-)  While SNOBOL may qualify, perl
> and python are bad hacks at best.  Hmmm....  Now that you mention it, I
> wonder if MUMPS (aka ANSI M) does?  Now, where did I leave that manual...

:-)
Unfortunately my brain is mushy, as usual. Neither perl nor python 
actually had this. I know I've seen it somewhere else, but I can't 
recall now.
Oh well...

And I've never used MUMPS. But you have to admit that subtracting 
strings is not really such a weird operation. At least I know that I've 
wished that other languages had it from time to time. And it's not 
conceptually a big step from string concatenation using '+'.

	Johnny