From mboxrd@z Thu Jan 1 00:00:00 1970 Message-Id: <1BFBC4E6-D61B-468F-9BC5-C33EE27AC1A4@mac.com> From: Pietro Gagliardi To: Fans of the OS Plan 9 from Bell Labs <9fans@9fans.net> In-Reply-To: <79DA81FE-595B-4E0A-A60E-CD0A45430623@mac.com> Content-Type: text/plain; charset=US-ASCII; format=flowed; delsp=yes Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit Mime-Version: 1.0 (Apple Message framework v919.2) Date: Thu, 1 May 2008 22:34:37 -0400 References: <5aa5b5ad4831d46b8a699424000e6134@quanstro.net> <79DA81FE-595B-4E0A-A60E-CD0A45430623@mac.com> Subject: Re: [9fans] A new language for Plan 9 Topicbox-Message-UUID: 9c780104-ead3-11e9-9d60-3106f5b1d025 On May 1, 2008, at 10:21 PM, Pietro Gagliardi wrote: > > On May 1, 2008, at 9:26 PM, erik quanstrom wrote: > >>> one does >>> >>> if key = 'c' then >>> scanline >>> runcommand >>> else >>> generate(key) >>> assemble(key) >>> >>> This is similar to Python, and prevents the nesting ambiguity of C, >>> Pascal, and some other languages that use block delimiters. >> >> don't forget fortran. >> > [off topic] I wonder why it took 20 or so years for Fortran to > introduce IF..ELSE..END IF. Probably after Kernighan and Plauger, > 1974, it finally came to Backus' senses. :-P > Also, the decision not to include goto satisfies some of the elements they describe, as well as being deliberate. There are good languages that lack gotos completely and yet you can write programs in it. Take Java as a perfect example - it reserves goto but doesn't use it. Java has been used for production-class and enterprise-class applications (J2EE stands for Java 2 Enterprise Edition, after all). In Bentley you can say goto := 4