Re: [stack] stOck

On Apr 2, 2009, at 4:40 AM, spir wrote:

> My point was that these operations do not map to anything in the  
> model, or solution,

Sure.

> As such, I view them as annoyance and an unnecessary additional  
> obstacle

This is a leap. You're forgetting that a language that requires such  
things may derive benefits from such a design that you're not  
accounting for. If you think the pointfree approach buys you nothing,  
then sure, they're strictly an annoyance.

> It is based on the idea that a *good* programming language is one  
> that lets one express as straightforwardly as possible one's "model"

The most straightforward expression isn't always the most easy to  
reason about or the most easy to reuse. If your goal is a language  
that emphasizes correctness, it is reasonable to think you may have to  
state things in a manner more explicit or more abstract (e.g. in terms  
of morphisms instead of general recursion). If your goal is a language  
that makes programs easier to manipulate and refactor, it may make  
sense to disallow the use of variables.

A good language is one that allows you to be sure that you're writing  
high quality software and allows you to get there with the least  
amount of effort possible. Anything else is a means towards that end.

> In C or Pascal you need an index only because of (wrong) language  
> design

What else would you do given that the lengths of arrays aren't passed  
along with them?

- John