On Jan 15, 2006, at 11:14 AM, Kevin Toppenberg wrote:
Usually BASIC is put forward as a bare minmum language. And as I now
reflect, traditional Basic does have some of the same issues as M
regarding globally-scoped variables. But Basic has been revamped so
that today enterprise applications can be written in it.
Technically, M is dynamically scoped (because the NEW command
introduces new scopes). It is interesting that Python (for example)
is dynamically scoped, but the current block is the default and there
is a global operator that can be used to indicate global scope. I'm
not a big fan of dynamic scope, but it's not really a problem with
the language. The real issue here (as I see it) is that M tries to
make things easier for the compiler writer at the expense of the
application programmer by trying to push as many variables as
possible to the global frame. Such thinking is outmoded, and is not
conducive to sound development practices.
My biggest beefs with M would be the issue of variable scoping,
allowance of single letter commands leading to code that is very
difficult for newcomers to read, and limitation to 8 characters in
variable names etc (made worse by the need for namespacing.)
I agree. Both restrictions need to go. More importantly, though,
using symbol variable names to implement namespaces is a very sloppy
solution. Making namespaces (or packages or modules) first class
objects is a much better solution.
I know
that this last point has been fixed in Cache' and GT.M, but is still
not used in the VA.
And this is before talking about OO ability found in newer languages.
I'm still of two minds with regard to OO programming. It is a very
useful technique, but not the be and end all of software design. In
fact, I think it's rather sad that the local Barnes and Noble has one
section named "Programming" where you can find books about compilers,
languages, APIs, algorithms, etc., and one named "Software
Engineering" that is essentially all about OO. We've lost our
perspective here.
Kevin
===
Gregory Woodhouse
[EMAIL PROTECTED]
"Without the requirement of mathematical aesthetics a great many
discoveries would not have been made."
-- Albert Einstein
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