[Info-vax] Rust as a HS language, was: Re: Quiet?

[Bill Gunshannon]

On 4/6/22 12:35, Arne Vajhøj wrote:
> On 4/6/2022 12:08 PM, Bill Gunshannon wrote:
>> On 4/5/22 20:20, Arne Vajhøj wrote:
>>> On 4/5/2022 8:08 PM, Bill Gunshannon wrote:
>>>> On 4/5/22 19:46, Arne Vajhøj wrote:
>>>>> C and C++ are currently dominating the low level code area, but
>>>>> there are some well known problem.
>>>>>
>>>>> Two of those problems are:
>>>>> * buffer overruns
>>>>> * memory leaks
>>>>
>>>> Both those problems were fixed 40 years ago.  The fixes were
>>>> ignored and the company offering Safe C went out of business.
>>>
>>> They were not fixed as the current C compilers allow
>>> the problems.
>>>
>>> Maybe they could have been fixed, but that does not really
>>> help those with C code today.
>>
>> Let me re-word that.  40 years ago the problems were well known
>> and documented.  A company created a C compiler and support package
>> to fix it.  The industry rejected it because the cost (and I don't
>> mean the purchase price!) was too high.
>>
>> It is interesting that very little of this made it into the C
>> Standard which is when they could have fixed all of it.  And
>> they can't use the backwards compatibility argument because
>> there was no compatibility maintained between K&R and ANSI C.
> 
> How much is known about why that product failed?

Today, little more than memories.  I don't imagine Don French is
still around to ask but when the subject was discussed more than
20 years ago the general understanding was that the overhead was
much more than users were willing to put up with.  Another example
of something ahead of its time. (Like the UCSD P-machine and the
STVOS.)

> 
> I could have been the overhead. But I doubt it. Many languages
> from that era did either check or had the option of enabling checks.

And many did not.  COBOL never did precisely because of the overhead.
(Not sure if it does it today.)  Fortran may have been weak in this
respect as I can remember working on a lot of programs where the
solution seemed to hint at bounds problems.  Pascal seemed to always
have the option to turn all of it off.  I think the intent was to
develop with it on and then turn it off for the performance value
when ready for production. (Again remembering that production was
never Wirth's purpose for the language!)

> 
> And today it would almost certainly not have been an issue. Most
> languages check.

And yet, C still doesn't even after ANSI got control of it.  I am
now curious about COBOL, though.  I wonder if I can find the deck
from my demo program from the classroom in 1980?

bill