In no way did I mean to diminish the work. Instead, I was admiring how our knowledge of the field has continued to grow through the work they have done. -rob On Wed, May 26, 2021 at 1:03 PM Larry McVoy wrote: > You do, I don't. I'm not alone in my lack of understanding. > > I think that all the things that yacc solved, Steve gets some kudos. > I've used it a bunch and I did not need to be as smart as you or > Steve to get the job done. > > You getting past that is cool but it doesn't make his work less. > > On Wed, May 26, 2021 at 10:37:45AM +1000, Rob Pike wrote: > > And today, we understand parsing so well we don't need yacc. > > > > -rob > > > > > > On Wed, May 26, 2021 at 10:20 AM Nelson H. F. Beebe > > > wrote: > > > > > The last article of the latest issue of the Communications of the ACM > > > that appeared electronically earlier today is a brief interview with > > > this year's ACM Turing Award winners, Al Aho and Jeff Ullman. > > > > > > The article is > > > > > > Last byte: Shaping the foundations of programming languages > > > https://doi.org/10.1145/3460442 > > > Comm. ACM 64(6), 120, 119, June 2021. > > > > > > and it includes a picture of the two winners sitting on Dennis > > > Ritchie's couch. > > > > > > I liked this snippet from Jeff Ullman, praising fellow list member > > > Steve Johnson's landmark program, yacc: > > > > > > >> ... > > > >> At the time of the first Fortran compiler, it took several > > > >> person-years to write a parser. By the time yacc came around, > > > >> you could do it in an afternoon. > > > >> ... > > > > > > > > > > ------------------------------------------------------------------------------- > > > - Nelson H. F. Beebe Tel: +1 801 581 5254 > > > - > > > - University of Utah FAX: +1 801 581 4148 > > > - > > > - Department of Mathematics, 110 LCB Internet e-mail: > > > beebe@math.utah.edu - > > > - 155 S 1400 E RM 233 beebe@acm.org > > > beebe@computer.org - > > > - Salt Lake City, UT 84112-0090, USA URL: > > > http://www.math.utah.edu/~beebe/ - > > > > > > > ------------------------------------------------------------------------------- > > > > > -- > --- > Larry McVoy lm at mcvoy.com > http://www.mcvoy.com/lm >