Hello Donna; "Cooked with a spicy sauce containing tomatoes, onions, and peppers" ... you may have something. ;-)
------------------------------------------------------------------------ |\/| Randy A MacDonald | APL: If you can say it, it's done.. (ram) |/\| [EMAIL PROTECTED] | |\ | |If you cannot describe what you are doing BSc(Math) UNBF'83 þas a process, you don't know what you're doing. Sapere Aude | - W. E. Deming Natural Born APL'er | Demo website: http://156.34.64.225/ -----------------------------------------------------(INTP)----{ gnat }- ----- Original Message ----- From: "dly" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> To: "General forum" <[email protected]> Sent: Friday, June 16, 2006 6:43 AM Subject: Re: [Jgeneral] Mathematica and its roots > > > On 16-Jun-06, at 3:24 AM, Stefano Lanzavecchia wrote: > > > > True, not into the syntax, but into their standard libraries. LINQ > > will move > > map/reduce even closer to the actual syntax of the language. But > > it's up to > > the people to use it. I would. > > > I once (1989) asked Ken Iverson why people did not adopt the same > syntax for their code as for the primitive operators of APL. This > led to a number of conversations about even correcting some of the > implementations of APL primitives that were not ideal. He explained > the need to get rid of the index origin. He talked about J. > > But then, there are a lot of people contributing to J. > > Like natural language, programming language can become pidgin or creole. > > Donna > [EMAIL PROTECTED] > > > > On 16-Jun-06, at 3:24 AM, Stefano Lanzavecchia wrote: > > >> C and C++ don't have / , which is why it is in the STL. I could > >> write > >> / in almost any language (particularly one with macros or a > >> preprocessor), but I'm specifically talking about mainstream > >> languages > >> building it into the syntax. Besides, I've had to read a lot of C+ > >> + and > >> I've never seen the use of accumulate. > > > > Surely you don't expect the syntax of C and C++ to change... People > > are > > still writing Fortan70 despite the existence of Fortran90... > > > >> Currently, the majority of commercial code* is written in C, C++, > >> Java, > >> C#, and VB (6 and .NET). AFAIK, none of those languages have / > >> built > > > > True, not into the syntax, but into their standard libraries. LINQ > > will move > > map/reduce even closer to the actual syntax of the language. But > > it's up to > > the people to use it. I would. > > > >> extent within each program). Better yet, I'd like to know what > >> proportion of professional programmers understand and use it**. > > > > Probably very small. But... Have you ever read programs written by > > a badly > > trained APL developer? Is it the fault of the language the fact > > that there > > are thousands of so-so C++ developers? A colleague of mine once had > > to write > > a large and complex application in Excel using VBA. The first thing > > he did > > was to build himself a library of APL-like functions and > > operators... Then > > he wrote the add-in into this hybrid language. Unsurprisingly it > > was at the > > same time efficient, relatively bug-free and readable. But when I > > showed > > some people that it was possible to write rank-independent code in VB, > > though it wasn't pretty, those people cringed in fear. Is it the > > language's > > fault or the bad training? > > > > > > -- > > WildHeart'2k6 - mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED] > > My digipics and blogs: http://spaces.msn.com/members/wildy2k5/ > > > > > > ---------------------------------------------------------------------- > > For information about J forums see http://www.jsoftware.com/forums.htm > > ---------------------------------------------------------------------- > For information about J forums see http://www.jsoftware.com/forums.htm > ---------------------------------------------------------------------- For information about J forums see http://www.jsoftware.com/forums.htm
