At 1:13 PM -0400 7/3/07, Ken Robinson wrote:
Quoting Andy Dirnberger <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>:
As far as i goes, I've always assumed it was just shorthand for something
like index or increment. Nested for loops are often then controlled with j
and then k. You can use these with confidence that people will understand
the meaning. But if you feel more comfortable using a variable called
$counter than one called $i, by all means do so. There are plenty of people
out there who refuse to use i.
The use of variable names like $i, $j, $k, etc for counters is a
hold over from early Fortran which declared that only variables
starting with certain letters could be integers. The first letter
was "i". I seem to remember that only the letters i, j, l, l, m, n
were used for integer variables, so the use quickly became a
"standard" and it's been carried over into other languages through
the use of examples written by old time programmers.
Ken
Hey, let's watch those "old programmer" remarks, because some of us
are still around. But, you are right about the i, j, k, l, m, n
integer thing as a legacy from FORTRAN. Oh, those were the good old
days when programming was more like adventures in key punching. Where
you would drop off a large stack of IBM cards one day and then pick
up a few reams of paper the next day with all your key punching
errors.
Cheers,
tedd
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