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From: Janis Papanagnou <janis_papanagnou+ng@hotmail.com>
Newsgroups: comp.lang.c
Subject: Re: question about linker
Date: Thu, 5 Dec 2024 13:42:07 +0100
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On 04.12.2024 21:47, Bart wrote:
> On 04/12/2024 19:23, Janis Papanagnou wrote:
>> On 04.12.2024 18:43, Bart wrote:
> 
> You really hate toy languages don't you?

No.

> [...]
> 
> When someone has claimed to write some program, do you always demand
> they produce a 'formal grammar' for it?

No.

> 
> What is the complexity threshold anyway for something to need such a
> formal specification?

It depends. (There can't be a simple answer here.)

> 
> What input would even be classed as a language: are binary file formats
> languages? What about the commands of a CLI?

Inspect the Web, for example Wikipedia, to learn what a language
and specifically a formal language is (if you really don't know
that).

> [...]
> 
>> That's nothing more then a hacker's feeble excuse to justify his
>> ignorance.
> 
> So you're calling me a hacker, and you're calling me ignorant.

Yes, I think in some areas of software development you expose the
mentality of a hacker.

Yes, I think you are ignorant concerning some basic topics we were
discussing here...

> 
> Nice.

....but obviously (as opposed to you) I don't consider "ignorance"
("not knowing") being a Bad Thing; rather I think that ignorance
is a human's normal state where we all start from and (hopefully)
from where we continue learning.

(Showing ignorance on a topic while at the same time pretending
to know is not what I appreciate, though.)

> [...]
> 
> My own products were in-house tools to get stuff done. And they worked
> spectacularly well.

Yes, that was already acknowledged (also by me) several times here.

> [...]
> 
> OK, you're a professional; I'm an amateur (an amateur who managed to
> retire at 42). I will give you that. Satisfied?

Huh? - Most people here I consider to be "professionals" (in one
way or the other, maybe), and I didn't exclude you.

I am speaking about professional contexts where it matters more
what decisions you make with a project. Where you can't just try
out many things, where you have to plan things, where you make
studies and market analysis, where you work in teams, cooperate
with other companies, in local, distributed, or global settings
where you specify your products and test them, where you use and
rely on standards. And so on...

When you once wrote about whether I wouldn't think that you are
a capable software writer (or some such), I can assert you that
I think you are. - But what I thought was: What potential would
that guy have if he'd have had more contact with a couple of
companies to merge his own capabilities with the companies', so
that the companies and he himself would gain from that.

>>> [...]
>>>
>>> For the rest of us, that part is the simplest part of a compiler. You
>>> write it, and move on.
>>
>> Is that the reason why your languages and compilers are so widespread
>> used? </sarcasm>
> 
> By contrast, the languages that you've devised are in common use of course?

I'm not a developer of languages - at least I don't count my own
language implementations as worthwhile since they just served my
personal purposes, and it certainly wouldn't appear to me to brag
about them. - Generally there was no necessity; in professional
contexts we certainly used existing languages (for good reasons),
and also privately I'm using existing languages for programming.
I mean, it would be really silly if I want to write an OO designed
system and, instead of just using C++, would complain about its
crude syntax and write my own C+++ before doing the intended job.

Janis