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From: Bob Eager <news0009@eager.cx>
Newsgroups: alt.folklore.computers,comp.os.linux.misc
Subject: Re: TeX and Pascal [was Re: The joy of FORTRAN]
Date: 4 Oct 2024 10:59:07 GMT
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On Thu, 03 Oct 2024 16:34:15 -0700, Peter Flass wrote:

> Louis Krupp <lkrupp@invalid.pssw.com.invalid> wrote:
>> On 10/1/2024 3:48 PM, Lawrence D'Oliveiro wrote:
>>> On Tue, 1 Oct 2024 16:14:37 +0100, The Natural Philosopher wrote:
>>> 
>>>> And knowing that p=(x>y?3:2);
>>> I would have done it without the parentheses. There’s too much
>>> parenthesis clutter around as it is.
>> 
>> Add some spaces, and you've got something downright readable:
>> 
>>     p = x > y ? 3 : 2;
>> 
>> Maybe add parentheses around the comparison, especially if it's long or
>> complex, which this isn't:
>> 
>>     p = (x > y) ? 3 : 2;
>> 
>> It's idiomatic C. It's everywhere. Perl and Python have something
>> similar. So does Unisys ALGOL, not that anyone cares:
>> 
>>     P := IF X > Y THEN 3 ELSE 2;
>> 
>> If you want to see gratuitous cleverness for the sake of cleverness,
>> there's this:
>> 
>>     p = (x > y) + 2;
>> 
>> Please don't do that. Would you write:
>> 
>>     P := REAL((X > Y) AND TRUE) + 2;
>> 
>> if you were doing this in ALGOL?
>> 
>> I didn't think so.
>> 
>> Louis
>> 
>> 
>> 
>> 
>> 
> I like the Unisys version. At the cost of a couple of characters it’s
> readable. The C version is not straightforward for those of us for whom
> C is a second or third language.

The C version, of course, was merely a syntactic change from the BCPL 
version (on which, via B, it was based):

 p := (x > y) -> 3, 2

(parentheses optional)

-- 
Using UNIX since v6 (1975)...

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