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Subject:  Re: Why I won't use ANSI C

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From:         Ray Dunn <ray at micomvax.uucp>
Subject:      Re: Why I won't use ANSI C
Comments: To: info-c at brl-smoke.arpa
To:           Vic Kapella <SXJVK at ALASKA>

In article <671 at cresswell.quintus.UUCP> Richard A. O'Keefe writes:
>At the last count, I have made 8 attempts to send e-mail to Doug Gwyn.
>Here's what I've tried to send:
>    Thank you very much for your postings in comp.lang.c.
>    I very much appreciate the work you put into them.
>

Richard included this in response to a flame I wrote criticising Doug on a
number of points.

To a certain extent I agree with the sentiments expressed above by Richard
even though (if anyone cares) I sometimes vent my frustration at some of
Doug's idiosyncratic responses.

If you hold yourself up as an authority, as Doug does, you must be very
careful to maintain your credibility.  Unfortunately, Doug often appears to
not know when to keep his mouth firmly shut and leave things well alone.  He
appears to always need to justify everything he says or is trivially
criticised for, even if this means getting into arguments which at best,
border on the specious or untenable.

Now, fair enough, this is Doug, and he can only act as his personality
dictates, but it *is* sometimes annoying, and it leaves him open to this
sort of complaint (which he should probably learn to "verbally" ignore).
More important however, in my mind it denegrates the "quality" of his
postings and his credibility as an authority.  *Perhaps* he does not fully
realize the *responsibility* of the position he has voluntarily undertaken.

What does it matter if *I* spout off, who am I, but Doug has positioned
himself such that his readers should be able to rely on the veracity of his
remarks.  He should thus be careful what he says and how he says it.

Earlier gurus of 4 or 5 years ago, who, apart from the fact that they did
not seem to have any axe to grind as Doug often appears to have, would
rarely resort to sarcasm and downright dismissal of others views!  [Mind
you, Chris Torek seems to be getting a littly crotchetty in his old age
these days! (:-)].

I could go on, I'll spare you though (whew!) except to say that I *do*
believe that we should remember that Doug's position on the ANSI committee
gives him a certain power, but *not* necessarily a superior opinion on the
contentious issues we all discuss (argue? shout about? go to sleep over?...).

If anyone wants to follow up this posting, please choose an appropriate news
group.  Don't ask me, I don't know what's appropriate, but we'd better leave
this group for crying about the message rather than shooting the messengers
(:-).

Ray Dunn.  ..{philabs, mnetor, musocs}!micomvax!ray