[TUHS] Re: Minimum Array Sizes in 16 bit C (was Maximum)

[Larry McVoy <lm@mcvoy.com>]

On Tue, Oct 01, 2024 at 07:47:10AM -0600, arnold@skeeve.com wrote:
> Larry McVoy <lm@mcvoy.com> wrote:
> 
> > On Tue, Oct 01, 2024 at 07:13:04AM -0600, arnold@skeeve.com wrote:
> > > Would the word have been better off if Ada had caught on everywhere?
> > > Probably.  When I was in grad school studying language design, circa 1982,
> > > it was expected to do so.  But the language was VERY challenging for
> > > compiler writers.  
> >
> > Huh.  Rob Netzer and I, as grad students, took cs701 and cs702 at UW Madison.
> > It was the compilers course (701) and the really hard compilers course (702)
> > at the time.  The first course was to write a compiler for a subset of Ada
> > and the second on increased the subset to be almost complete.
> >
> > We were supposed to do it on an IBM mainframe because the professor had his
> > own version of lex/yacc there.  Rob had a 3b1 and asked if we could do it
> > there if he rewrote the parser stuff.  Prof said sure.
> >
> > In one semester we had a compiler, no optimizer and not much in the
> > way of graceful error handling, but it compiled stuff that ran.  We did
> > all of Ada other than late binding of variables (I think that was Ada's
> > templates) and threads and probably some other stuff I don't remember.
> 
> Did you do generics?  That and the run time, which had some real-time
> bits to it (*IIRC*, it's been a long time), as well as the cross
> object code type checking, would have been real bears.

None of those ring a bell so

> Like many things, the first 90% is easy, the second 90% is hard. :-)

I guess we did the easy stuff :-(

> > I don't consider myself to be that good of a programmer, I can point to
> > dozens of people my age that can run circles around me and I'm sure there
> > are many more.
> 
> You are undoubtedly better than you give yourself credit for, even
> if there were people who could run circles around you.  I learned
> a long time ago, that no matter how good you are, there's always
> someone better than you at something. I decided long ago to not
> try to compete with Superman.

Funny, I've come to the same conclusion, both in programming and my
retirement hobby.  There is always someone way better than me, but
you are correct, that doesn't mean I'm awful.  Just have more to 
learn.

A buddy pointed out that I was probably better than 80% of the people
leaving the dock, it's just I fish with a guy who is better than pretty
much everyone.

> > But apparently the bar is pretty low these days and I agree, that's sad.
> 
> And it makes it much less fun to be out in the working world. :-(

As a guy in his 2nd retirement (1st didn't stick) I can tell you I am
so happy not having to deal with work stuff.  My buddies who are still
working tell me stories I find difficult to believe.  They all say I'm
so politically incorrect that I wouldn't last a week in today's world.
If their stories are true, yeah, that's not for me.

Weird politics and crappy programmers, count me out.