[Info-vax] General Availability of 9.2 for x86-64

[Bill Gunshannon]

On 7/19/22 08:37, Simon Clubley wrote:
> On 2022-07-18, Arne Vajhøj <arne at vajhoej.dk> wrote:
>> On 7/18/2022 2:16 PM, Simon Clubley wrote:
>>> On 2022-07-16, Arne Vajhøj <arne at vajhoej.dk> wrote:
>>>> VMS Fortran and VMS C++ does not support newer standards - but those
>>>> newer standards are used on other platforms.
>>>
>>> Devil's Advocate time: Does adding new standards to a language sometimes
>>> make it so complex that it's better to start over with a new language
>>> that covers the same usage cases ?
>>
>> I think so.
>>
>> But probably not in the case of Fortran 95 -> 2003 and
>> C++ 98 -> 11.
>>
>> (Fortran 77 -> 90 could have been a case)
>>
> 
> As can what's going on with C++ at the moment.
> 
> In the same way as the police have no motivation to reduce the overall
> number of criminals in society (after all, if you reduce the number of
> criminals, you reduce the number of police required), standards bodies
> have no motivation to declare a language "complete", because if they do,
> they will be out of a job.

Or like Doctors have no reason to cure illnesses.  They make too
much money treating repeat customers.  :-(

> 
> I wonder if we've reached the point where some standards bodies keep
> adding features for their own benefit (ie: to keep them in a job),
> instead of for the benefit of the software developers they claim to
> be working on behalf of ?

A recent discussion over in the COBOL group had me thinking of this
again.  His point was that something that should have been clearly
spelled out in the standard doesn't appear to be.  I think it is but
not where he was looking.  I would have confirmed this but I am
unwilling to pay ISO hundreds of dollars just to read a standard.

So this brings us to just what the purpose of standards are.  One would
think that the desire would be to make them as widespread as possible so
that people would actually use them, but no, we hide them and charge
ridiculous amounts of money just to read them (and ISO is not the only
one who does that!!)

And what should be in a standard?  Wouldn't you think the standards
bodies would talk to the practitioners before creating a standard to
get an idea what they need and want in a language?  But, no, they
write their standards in vacuums putting in things the practitioners
didn't ask for and certainly don't want.  And then get upset when the
practitioners refuse to use the crap they never wanted.  So then, why
do they put it in the standard?

And then you have all the stuff the practitioners wanted that the
standards bodies refused to consider.  The result is vendor extensions
with each vendor doing the same task differently instead of all of them
doing the same way.

I really think it is time to drop the concept of academia generating
standards and create a standards body concept made up of and run by
the practitioners of the IT world.  I think it would get corporate
support because they stand to profit from it in the long run.


bill