[Info-vax] The (now lost) future of Alpha.

[invalid]

On 2018-08-02, Johnny Billquist <bqt at softjar.se> wrote:
> On 2018-08-01 20:07, invalid wrote:
>> On 2018-08-01, Arne Vajhøj <arne at vajhoej.dk> wrote:
>>> On 7/31/2018 4:18 PM, invalid wrote:
>>>> On 2018-07-29, Simon Clubley <clubley at remove_me.eisner.decus.org-Earth.UFP> wrote:
>>>>> On 2018-07-29, invalid <address at is.invalid> wrote:
>>>>>> What should they have used to write a FORTRAN compiler in 1957 or 1966?
>>>>>> A COBOL compiler in 1959? A PL/I compiler in 1964?
>>>>>>
>>>>>
>>>>> High level languages were a _lot_ simpler back in those days. :-)
>>>>
>>>> Maybe, but the point was there was no other choice of implementation
>>>> language in those days. And 50+ years later  we're still using those
>>>> languages (except for IBM FORTRAN, which is sadly lost in time at F77+)
>>>> now. Which is why the compilers are still mostly assembler. Except maybe for
>>>> C/C++ which may be heading towards self-hosting.
>>>
>>>
>>> Well - C and C++ seems to be the most widely used languages
>>> for compilers (at least compilers generating native code).
>> 
>> C and C++ have less than .1% market share on the mainframe.
>
> Meanwhile mainframes represent maybe (optimistically( 0.1% of the total 
> market for compilers.

Maybe, but 99% of the world's transactions run through them.

> And for the 99.9% representing everything else, C 
> and C++ have maybe a 90% market share (if not more), meaning C and C++ 
> are totally dominating when it comes to languages for implementing 
> compilers.

Agreed.