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Re: Some ideas about c?

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On Wed, 17 May 2017 22:09:36 -0700 (PDT)
supercat@casperkitty.com wrote:

> Parts of the standard libraries are useful, but many parts are just plain
> horribly designed.  Further, there are many application fields where only
> small portions of the standard libraries get used at all, and relatively
> few parts would be indispensable.  Having sets of common libraries is
> helpful, but trying to have a one-size-fits-all approach that ignores
> features that are available on many systems and needed for many applications
> (e.g. character-at-a-time console input) is not particularly helpful.

That's even worse with the generic programming paradigm pushed by the STL.
Generic programming aims at being universal but lacks the effiency of a well
designed solution. Once more, the programmer is forced to adapt his approach to
fit the generic logic without any added value.


> A key feature of the 1974 C which set it apart from other languages of
> the time was that given access to just a few OS primitives or abilities,
> almost everything in the Standard library could be accomplished entirely
> in C code.  Nowadays some compiler writers have an attitude that programmers
> shouldn't expect to be able to use memory as one type and then recycle it
> for use as another without using malloc/free or other such functions, but
> reading K&R it would seem one of the things Ritchie was really proud of was
> that his language allowed programmers to do precisely that (I've not seen
> a Pascal book describe how to do such a thing in Pascal, for example).

Indeed. I assume that's why C provides the linkage notion bound to the a scope
in the hope that programmers could reuse every piece of memory.


> IMHO, C would be much better if it were somewhat better subdivided into a
> core language with a variety of optional features.  Many features should be
> expected in almost any quality implementation, but implementations that are
> subject to extreme resource constraints or other such considerations would
> not be required to support them all.  Failure to acknowledge features that
> are supported by many but not all implementations fragments the language far
> more than would recognition that there should be more than two kinds of
> implementation.

Although a standard library give a powerful impulse to the adoption of regular
features, however its extension is problematic.

In my eyes, the C standard shouldn't include a standard library in order to
concentrate all the effort on the true language definition. I would prefer the
C standard library to be a side project with a modular approach such as
different parts of the library can optionally be implemented and extended over
the time with a global scheme in mind.

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Thread

Some ideas about c? Vassilis Spiliopoulos <vassilis@vask1lux.de> - 2017-05-17 23:23 +0300
  Re: Some ideas about c? Ian Collins <ian-news@hotmail.com> - 2017-05-18 08:40 +1200
  Re: Some ideas about c? GOTHIER Nathan <nathan.gothier@gmail.com> - 2017-05-17 23:00 +0200
    Re: Some ideas about c? supercat@casperkitty.com - 2017-05-17 14:59 -0700
      Re: Some ideas about c? GOTHIER Nathan <nathan.gothier@gmail.com> - 2017-05-18 00:08 +0200
        Re: Some ideas about c? supercat@casperkitty.com - 2017-05-17 22:09 -0700
          Re: Some ideas about c? Ian Collins <ian-news@hotmail.com> - 2017-05-18 18:22 +1200
          Re: Some ideas about c? GOTHIER Nathan <nathan.gothier@gmail.com> - 2017-05-18 12:36 +0200
            Re: Some ideas about c? Malcolm McLean <malcolm.arthur.mclean@gmail.com> - 2017-05-18 03:53 -0700
              Re: Some ideas about c? GOTHIER Nathan <nathan.gothier@gmail.com> - 2017-05-18 14:24 +0200
                Re: Some ideas about c? Jerry Stuckle <jstucklex@attglobal.net> - 2017-05-18 08:37 -0400
                Re: Some ideas about c? Malcolm McLean <malcolm.arthur.mclean@gmail.com> - 2017-05-18 05:47 -0700
                Re: Some ideas about c? GOTHIER Nathan <nathan.gothier@gmail.com> - 2017-05-18 15:20 +0200
                Re: Some ideas about c? Malcolm McLean <malcolm.arthur.mclean@gmail.com> - 2017-05-18 06:28 -0700
                Re: Some ideas about c? scott@slp53.sl.home (Scott Lurndal) - 2017-05-18 13:56 +0000
                Re: Some ideas about c? GOTHIER Nathan <nathan.gothier@gmail.com> - 2017-05-18 16:30 +0200
                Re: Some ideas about c? Thiago Adams <thiago.adams@gmail.com> - 2017-05-18 07:45 -0700
                Re: Some ideas about c? Richard Heathfield <rjh@cpax.org.uk> - 2017-05-18 16:08 +0100
                Re: Some ideas about c? Malcolm McLean <malcolm.arthur.mclean@gmail.com> - 2017-05-18 08:15 -0700
                Re: Some ideas about c? Jerry Stuckle <jstucklex@attglobal.net> - 2017-05-18 11:46 -0400
                Re: Some ideas about c? Vassilis Spiliopoulos <vassilis@vask1lux.de> - 2017-05-18 21:33 +0300
                Re: Some ideas about c? Jerry Stuckle <jstucklex@attglobal.net> - 2017-05-18 15:29 -0400
                Re: Some ideas about c? GOTHIER Nathan <nathan.gothier@gmail.com> - 2017-05-19 01:23 +0200
                Re: Some ideas about c? Thiago Adams <thiago.adams@gmail.com> - 2017-05-18 18:12 -0700
                Re: Some ideas about c? Thiago Adams <thiago.adams@gmail.com> - 2017-05-18 10:08 -0700
                Re: Some ideas about c? GOTHIER Nathan <nathan.gothier@gmail.com> - 2017-05-19 00:39 +0200
                Re: Some ideas about c? Vassilis Spiliopoulos <vassilis@vask1lux.de> - 2017-05-19 14:27 +0300
                Re: Some ideas about c? David Brown <david.brown@hesbynett.no> - 2017-05-19 13:41 +0200
                Re: Some ideas about c? Richard Heathfield <rjh@cpax.org.uk> - 2017-05-19 13:04 +0100
                Re: Some ideas about c? Keith Thompson <kst-u@mib.org> - 2017-05-19 10:00 -0700
                Re: Some ideas about c? GOTHIER Nathan <nathan.gothier@gmail.com> - 2017-05-19 14:14 +0200
                Re: Some ideas about c? Jerry Stuckle <jstucklex@attglobal.net> - 2017-05-18 11:33 -0400
                Re: Some ideas about c? Malcolm McLean <malcolm.arthur.mclean@gmail.com> - 2017-05-18 08:47 -0700
                Re: Some ideas about c? supercat@casperkitty.com - 2017-05-18 08:48 -0700
                Re: Some ideas about c? Malcolm McLean <malcolm.arthur.mclean@gmail.com> - 2017-05-18 09:02 -0700
                Re: Some ideas about c? supercat@casperkitty.com - 2017-05-18 10:52 -0700
                Re: Some ideas about c? Jerry Stuckle <jstucklex@attglobal.net> - 2017-05-18 15:35 -0400
                Re: Some ideas about c? supercat@casperkitty.com - 2017-05-18 14:01 -0700
                Re: Some ideas about c? Jerry Stuckle <jstucklex@attglobal.net> - 2017-05-18 17:38 -0400
                Re: Some ideas about c? supercat@casperkitty.com - 2017-05-18 15:54 -0700
                Re: Some ideas about c? Jerry Stuckle <jstucklex@attglobal.net> - 2017-05-18 22:17 -0400
                Re: Some ideas about c? John Bode <jfbode1029@gmail.com> - 2017-05-18 08:06 -0700
                Re: Some ideas about c? John Bode <jfbode1029@gmail.com> - 2017-05-18 09:17 -0700
  Re: Some ideas about c? fir <profesor.fir@gmail.com> - 2017-05-17 14:34 -0700
    Re: Some ideas about c? Vassilis Spiliopoulos <vassilis@vask1lux.de> - 2017-05-18 16:16 +0300
  Re: Some ideas about c? Cholo Lennon <chololennon@hotmail.com> - 2017-05-18 10:26 -0300
  Re: Some ideas about c? John Bode <jfbode1029@gmail.com> - 2017-05-18 07:36 -0700
    Re: Some ideas about c? scott@slp53.sl.home (Scott Lurndal) - 2017-05-18 18:23 +0000
      Re: Some ideas about c? Gareth Owen <gwowen@gmail.com> - 2017-05-18 21:51 +0100
        Re: Some ideas about c? scott@slp53.sl.home (Scott Lurndal) - 2017-05-19 12:38 +0000
          Re: Some ideas about c? supercat@casperkitty.com - 2017-05-19 07:44 -0700
            Re: Some ideas about c? Ben Bacarisse <ben.usenet@bsb.me.uk> - 2017-05-19 16:45 +0100
              Re: Some ideas about c? Tim Rentsch <txr@alumni.caltech.edu> - 2017-05-19 21:59 -0700
            Re: Some ideas about c? Keith Thompson <kst-u@mib.org> - 2017-05-19 10:06 -0700
              Re: Some ideas about c? Ben Bacarisse <ben.usenet@bsb.me.uk> - 2017-05-19 18:18 +0100
                Re: Some ideas about c? Keith Thompson <kst-u@mib.org> - 2017-05-19 11:59 -0700
                Re: Some ideas about c? Ben Bacarisse <ben.usenet@bsb.me.uk> - 2017-05-19 21:05 +0100
          Re: Some ideas about c? "James R. Kuyper" <jameskuyper@verizon.net> - 2017-05-19 12:42 -0400
            Re: Some ideas about c? Richard Heathfield <rjh@cpax.org.uk> - 2017-05-19 17:54 +0100
            Re: Some ideas about c? Gareth Owen <gwowen@gmail.com> - 2017-05-19 18:52 +0100
          Re: Some ideas about c? Gareth Owen <gwowen@gmail.com> - 2017-05-19 18:51 +0100
            Re: Some ideas about c? scott@slp53.sl.home (Scott Lurndal) - 2017-05-19 18:55 +0000
              Re: Some ideas about c? Gareth Owen <gwowen@gmail.com> - 2017-05-19 19:58 +0100
              Re: Some ideas about c? Keith Thompson <kst-u@mib.org> - 2017-05-19 12:12 -0700
            Re: Some ideas about c? Keith Thompson <kst-u@mib.org> - 2017-05-19 12:01 -0700
    Re: Some ideas about c? Ian Collins <ian-news@hotmail.com> - 2017-05-19 08:22 +1200
      Re: Some ideas about c? Gareth Owen <gwowen@gmail.com> - 2017-05-18 21:53 +0100
      Re: Some ideas about c? scott@slp53.sl.home (Scott Lurndal) - 2017-05-19 12:36 +0000
        Re: Some ideas about c? Gareth Owen <gwowen@gmail.com> - 2017-05-19 18:54 +0100
          Re: Some ideas about c? scott@slp53.sl.home (Scott Lurndal) - 2017-05-19 18:58 +0000
            Re: Some ideas about c? Keith Thompson <kst-u@mib.org> - 2017-05-19 12:18 -0700

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