Warp wrote:
> Darren New <dne### [at] sanrrcom> wrote:
>> I really have to wonder, sometimes, how far people are going to mutate C++ 
>> before they just give up and decide they're done. :-)
> 
>   You make it sound like C++ is the only language which is constantly
> being developed further by adding new features and new libraries (and
> that this is somehow a negative thing?). That other currently used languages
> are more or less "ready" and do not change much.

No. But I think the current languages don't rewrite themselves as severely 
as C++ does. Other languages tend to add things, while C++ makes them 
fundamental parts of the language.  I'm assuming that the lambdas that C++ 
is adding won't be just a library bit. If it is, then bleh, but OK.

>   Of course that's pure BS. Most currently popular languages are being
> constantly developed further and their libraries enhanced. Look at Java, C#
> or the .NET framework. It's not that long ago that Java didn't even have
> generics. Now it has them.

Generics in Java are syntactic sugar. It still generates exactly the same 
code as the equivalent source done in the obvious way.

> What is the current version of .NET? 3.something?

Sure. And it has new syntax for new stuff, and it's cleanly integrated with 
the rest of the language.

>   Why do you deliberately make it sound like C++ is the only modern language
> for which new features are being added?

I'm not. I'm criticizing the way C++ adds new features, not that it does.

Every new feature in C++ seems to be hurt by (1) not wanting to pay any 
price if you don't use it, (2) not wanting to add any syntax for it, and (3) 
interacting poorly and confusingly with every other feature of the language.

If C++ added lambdas and they actually had things like pointers to stack 
frames and so on, I'd probably not be bothered. But I strongly suspect the 
lambdas they add are going to have so much brokenness to deal with the lack 
of automatic memory management and such that it's going to be harder to use 
lambdas than to just declare your own functions. And I'm betting the syntax 
will be so baroque it's going to be almost impossible to read without doing 
parsing in your head, too. Looking the little I did at the Boost lambda's, 
they're utterly awful compared to any other language with real lambdas built in.

>   I don't know if I'm just being paranoid, but I honestly think that you
> are doing this for the simple reason that you know that you are going to
> troll me.

No. I just don't like C++.  I think the way things get added to C++ is a bad 
thing for a language. They're trying to add sophisticated things from other 
languages on top of a base that really can't support it, so it's wobbling 
like an inverted pyramid, leaving the programmers to run around the outside 
propping it up with flying buttresses in their code.

When C# added LINQ, they didn't try to change the syntax of the language 
without modifying the compiler.

Python added a lot of really ugly stuff under the covers, too. But it's 
under the covers, and doesn't get in your way if you don't use it, and it's 
usable for more than just the one idea the person thought of who suggested 
it. And they didn't make the feature horribly ugly and difficult to use in 
order to save one indirection.


I hereby promise to try to remember to mention I'm trolling you if I ever 
make a post just to troll you, Warp. Fair? I can't promise I won't succumb 
to the urge to tweak you, but I'll try to remember to let you know I'm just 
teasing ya. :-)

-- 
   Darren New, San Diego CA, USA (PST)
   My fortune cookie said, "You will soon be
   unable to read this, even at arm's length."

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