more about programming style

[Barry Shein]

ARGGH, forget it, C is a tiny little easily learned programming
language. If you can't be bothered to learn it then you shouldn't
be bothered to either program in it or manage people who do...period.

Now, consider a *real* case: PL/I, this language has thousands of
features, many of them redundant, many of them obscure.  Several
linear shelf feet of *basic* documentation, you could spend years
holding PL/I trivia contests (what does a leading '$' sign in a
decimal constant type do?)

My suggestion for *that* language was to enforce, by a compiler
option, that only a locally approved subset of the language be
allowed (say, a table that could be locally modified.)

My point is: Yes, this has come up in other contexts before. C
was designed by and large as a reaction to it, look at the C
reference manual, about 25 pages long (the back of K&R.)

And what about subroutines you 'dont understand', like scanf(),
which no one understands (:-).

Move over and let a pro do the work, your amateur status is showing.

	-Barry Shein, Boston University