From mboxrd@z Thu Jan 1 00:00:00 1970 X-Spam-Checker-Version: SpamAssassin 3.4.4 (2020-01-24) on polar.synack.me X-Spam-Level: X-Spam-Status: No, score=-1.9 required=5.0 tests=BAYES_00,FREEMAIL_FROM autolearn=unavailable autolearn_force=no version=3.4.4 X-Received: by 10.50.41.3 with SMTP id b3mr1293000igl.0.1405772271827; Sat, 19 Jul 2014 05:17:51 -0700 (PDT) X-Received: by 10.140.82.9 with SMTP id g9mr507qgd.12.1405772271792; Sat, 19 Jul 2014 05:17:51 -0700 (PDT) Path: border2.nntp.dca1.giganews.com!nntp.giganews.com!h18no2259839igc.0!news-out.google.com!cz11ni6302qab.1!nntp.google.com!v10no1442639qac.1!postnews.google.com!glegroupsg2000goo.googlegroups.com!not-for-mail Newsgroups: comp.lang.ada Date: Sat, 19 Jul 2014 05:17:51 -0700 (PDT) In-Reply-To: Complaints-To: groups-abuse@google.com Injection-Info: glegroupsg2000goo.googlegroups.com; posting-host=81.203.97.207; posting-account=xd0OrwoAAABQUGXxWZdZWv6VwPFSqa1J NNTP-Posting-Host: 81.203.97.207 References: User-Agent: G2/1.0 MIME-Version: 1.0 Message-ID: <9a51b46f-c70e-4266-9b44-dfb50c8a7191@googlegroups.com> Subject: Re: why the pascal family of languages (Pascal, Ada, Modula-2,2,Oberon, Delphi, Algol,...) failed compared to the C family? From: jm.tarrasa@gmail.com Injection-Date: Sat, 19 Jul 2014 12:17:51 +0000 Content-Type: text/plain; charset=ISO-8859-1 Content-Transfer-Encoding: quoted-printable Xref: number.nntp.dca.giganews.com comp.lang.ada:187706 Date: 2014-07-19T05:17:51-07:00 List-Id: What's the problem with pascal (and any other language)? what has been poin= ted before: The underlying system is C-like. When ever you want to access to a system utility, you need to write a weird= interface. If you use C, the interface is "natural". I'm a Pascal Guy. After BASIC, UCSD Pascal was my first love. Since then I = have used Turbo Pascal and Delphi, they were good and successful languages = because they had a good framework, that is, binding to all and every system= feature. Moreover for any new fabulous library that appeared, there was a = community and ecosystem that programed a binding. Nevertheless they couldn'= t keep the pace. There were more and more libraries with complex structures= (sound, network, mail, internet, video, graphics) that linking from C was = trivial, but linking from pascal was a good effort.=20 So, no language but C has a chance? Right, no general purpose language has = a chance. The languages are COBOL from old days for business, Fortran for calculus fr= om old days, and C/C++ for any other thing. There are new languages familie= s: Java, its new and wonderful feature is "runeverywhere" (something in the= old day's slow computers was a failure), Perl for dirty scripting (its bei= ng replaced), and finally PHP for web (oh my good!). And they inherited syn= tax from C, not from COBOL, or Fortran, and obviously not from Pascal. Pasc= al? What is Pascal? There are other languages competing for those niches: Python, Ruby, C#, ASP= and others. Trying to invade other's niches (Java and Python invaded web p= rogramming). But whenever they need to do something lowlevel or that needs = intensive calculus that can't be let to interpreted languages, they make a = library in C or C++ and interface it. Why C became "The system's language"? Not sure. Pascal started as prove of = concept and teaching language, not like a production language, so I'm not s= ure if there were other competitors. Beside this, C was for free in Unix, l= ike BASIC in DOS, but much better than BASIC. By the way, once I read that = AutoCAD started with Pascal, but replaced it because the compiler required = changing floppy disks several times for every compilation. What about Ada? Well it has the problems of any other general purpose langu= age plus money and appalling lack of ecosystem. It looks like Ada never eve= n made the effort of creating such ecosytem unless you were Boeing, Lookhee= d, or NASA. Now I program mostly in Java and Python (and don't like too much). I'm star= ting a new project (commercial, no GPL) and considered other languages inst= ead of Java: Delphi, Lazarus (freePascal similar to delphi) and Ada. Ada was something I liked to try but...=20 *Gnat Pro, 10.000$ seat. No way. It looks like it's only for deep pockets. = I'm not Boeing. *Gnat FSF, sorry, I have problems with the debugger in Linux. Something wit= hout support that doesn't work installed off-the-shelf is not for me for th= is project now (Lazarus works like a charm). *Janus. It could be for prize, I still have to evaluate it. What deters me is the lack of ecosystem. I look for a Crypto Library, I can= find in FreePascal libraries, or bindings to libssl. Sound? there is FreeP= ascal or Delphi. Integrate browser? wysiwyg editor? There are Delphi/lazaru= s components. What you find in Ada is a library sometimes maintained by a p= erson, but more worrying with a few users. I'm afraid that I will have to build the whole thing almost from scratch. B= eside I'm afraid that with the lack of people, customers and community behi= nd, a product like Janus could be discontinued in a near future.