Path: ...!eternal-september.org!feeder3.eternal-september.org!news.eternal-september.org!eternal-september.org!.POSTED!not-for-mail
From: bart <bc@freeuk.com>
Newsgroups: comp.lang.c
Subject: Re: do { quit; } else { }
Date: Sun, 13 Apr 2025 17:39:42 +0100
Organization: A noiseless patient Spider
Lines: 94
Message-ID: <vtgpce$39229$1@dont-email.me>
References: <vspbjh$8dvd$1@dont-email.me> <vt31m5$2513i$1@dont-email.me>
 <vt3d4g$2djqe$1@dont-email.me> <vt3iqh$2ka99$1@dont-email.me>
 <vt5fed$ccri$1@dont-email.me> <vt5js2$g1t7$1@dont-email.me>
 <20250409142303.00004645@yahoo.com> <87ikndqabc.fsf@nosuchdomain.example.com>
 <20250410115501.000037a5@yahoo.com> <vt8ei8$2vn84$1@dont-email.me>
 <20250410080629.532@kylheku.com> <vt94q5$3jjod$1@dont-email.me>
 <vt9628$3hhr8$3@dont-email.me> <vtammh$174ev$1@dont-email.me>
 <vtavn9$1dp7m$3@dont-email.me> <vtb8nv$1plb2$2@dont-email.me>
 <vtba81$1qfbm$1@dont-email.me> <vtbc6o$1te2o$1@dont-email.me>
 <vtbhjv$24api$1@dont-email.me> <vtbn2k$293r1$1@dont-email.me>
 <vtc19j$2kqlj$1@dont-email.me> <87a58mqt2o.fsf@nosuchdomain.example.com>
 <vtc7mp$2q5hr$1@dont-email.me> <vtcqf6$3j95s$1@dont-email.me>
 <vtdh4q$b3kt$1@dont-email.me> <vtf7fe$1qtpg$1@dont-email.me>
 <vtgfuf$31ug1$1@dont-email.me> <20250413072027.219@kylheku.com>
MIME-Version: 1.0
Content-Type: text/plain; charset=UTF-8; format=flowed
Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit
Injection-Date: Sun, 13 Apr 2025 18:39:42 +0200 (CEST)
Injection-Info: dont-email.me; posting-host="52da66fb1217a688011ca6698ca24832";
	logging-data="3442761"; mail-complaints-to="abuse@eternal-september.org";	posting-account="U2FsdGVkX1/wHsdKlZgWRvEj5i0I6tPB"
User-Agent: Mozilla Thunderbird
Cancel-Lock: sha1:1VQYz04LQ0z2177hMkrbKGdhoGE=
In-Reply-To: <20250413072027.219@kylheku.com>
Content-Language: en-GB
Bytes: 5870

On 13/04/2025 15:34, Kaz Kylheku wrote:
> On 2025-04-13, bart <bc@freeuk.com> wrote:
>> On 13/04/2025 03:27, Janis Papanagnou wrote:
>>> On 12.04.2025 13:00, bart wrote:
>>
>>>> But I also 100% hate its syntax and various other bits and pieces. (OK,
>>>> about 80% then.)
>>>
>>> (I also don't like its syntax too much. I think I'm just complaining
>>> less than you about that. BTW, I've got the impression that all the
>>> shortcomings of "C" are well known by most regulars here; they just
>>> handle these facts in discussions differently than you.)
>>
>> The shortcomings are downplayed considerably. Especially in discussions
>> involving me because they don't like it whenever someone states the obvious.
>>
>> But also, most here have to use it professionally, so have learned to
>> work around it.
> 
> There are lots of examples of people just liking C.


C itself, or the things that C allowed you to do?

I made a distinction a couple of posts up, where I said I liked what C 
could do, but not how it did it, in terms of language design.

People still like this class of language, even though now there are 
advanced alternatives (Rust etc) because of the freedom it allows and 
trust it puts in the programmer (even if C frowns on a lot of things via 
UB).

So it still comes down to there being few alternatives. Even where they 
exist, implementations may not be as ubiquitous or as mature as they are 
for C.

(When I generate C code it is for two reasons: for a target I don't 
directly support; or to use its optimising compilers. Or both.)


> Oh, Donald Knuth, in a 1993 Computer Literacy Bookshops interview:
> 
>    CLB: Did you integrate WEB with C because so many programmers today
>    are using it, or do you personally like C and write with it?
> 
>    Knuth: I think C has a lot of features that are very important. The
>    way C handles pointers, for example, was a brilliant innovation; it
>    solved a lot of problems that we had before in data structuring and
>    made the programs look good afterwards. C isn't the perfect language,
>    no language is, but I think it has a lot of virtues, and you can avoid
>    the parts you don't like.

Well, given Knuth's own language was MIX (assembly for a made-up 
machine), it is not surprising he prefers C.

  I do like C as a language, especially
>    because it blends in with the operating system (if you're using UNIX,
>    for example).

This is something I cited as a disadvantage. If using Unix, you can't 
get away from the influence of C. But Windows was also implemented 
significantly in C; that does a much better job of hiding it.

It also, for people using Unix, puts other systems languages at a 
disadvantage because C gets all the breaks.


>    All through my life, I've always used the programming language that
>    blended best with the debugging system and operating system that I'm
>    using. If I had a better debugger for language X, and if X went well
>    with the operating system, I would be using that.
> 
> Richard Stallman of the GNU Project: developed a C compiler and started
> cloning Unix in the mid 1980's, entirely as free software.
> 
> Billions of lines have been written in C as free open source since.
> 
> The reason some people have to use it for work is, ironically, is that
> people's unpaid side projects evolved into widely deployed platforms
> that the world relies on.
> 
> C has spawned imitation in the form of "C like" languages, that all
> started as grenfield projects that could have chosen any syntax
> they wanted.

Some of this is to be expected: if they started off using brace syntax, 
then their language will use braces. But some of the things they copy 
are odd, like this for-loop from JS:

   for(let i = 1; i <= 36; i++) {

Is it that hard to provide a proper for-loop where you don't have to 
spell out every single detail? Fortran managed it in the 1950s!