Re: Unicode in strings

Anton Ertl wrote:


snip

 

A similar concept was implemented in COBOL, where the designers though
that having to write
 
ADD A TO B GIVING C
 
or somesuch makes programming easier than writing
 
C = A+B
 
in FORTRAN.

I would put a slightly different spin on it.  I believe that the
original COBOL was designed not so much to make programming easier, but
to make *learning* programming (for non-programmers) easier, and
because it was supposedly "self documenting", easier for managers, etc.
to see how the program worked.  Remember, when COBOL was developed
(late 1950s), there weren't many programmers in existance, and it was
felt that the "mathematical" syntax of Fortran, would be too unfamiliar
to the business people who developed the new programs to solve business
problems, and who were generally not mathematicians.

Of course, they were wrong about "self documenting", and as more people
became programmers, the advantages of consice syntax made a big
difference.





--
 - Stephen Fuld
(e-mail address disguised to prevent spam)