2 Aug
2007
2 Aug
'07
10:23 a.m.
Brent Hilpert wrote:
To paraphrase Churchill: C is a terrible language,
except for all the others.
I like C, K & R only. I think with out the PDP 8 ^H 11 I don't think
C would ever have developed since the instruction set of the 11 is very
powerful and modern. You have a nice 1 to 1 mapping of instructions from
C to machine language.
Apropros of not much, but to ensure this is on-topic,
I never hear B or BCPL
mentioned, the ancestors of C, and even 'closer to the machine'. I'm not sure
how many C programmers these days even know it has such ancestors.
So where is programing language? 'A' :)
What I want to find is a hardcover black book (1970's). If I could remember the title
I could find the book. It was teaching the concepts of computer programing
but with a language higher than plain assembler. I have the bare machine
( well ok , just some blank proms at the moment ) and am still looking
for a good bootstrap language. Word width is 24 bits with 12 bit bytes,
and a 12 bit opcode so I don't need virtual machines with blah blah but
simple model 1 - index reg, 1 ac, 1 stack, Immediate and 1 base reg addressing.
Around 1980 I was programming in Z (dev'd at U of
Waterloo IIRC, Thoth/Verex
OS), another descendant of B/BCPL and so a sibling of C; a little simpler
and arguably cleaner than C but more data-typing than B/BCPL. Probably would
have been good for embedded systems/micro-controller stuff.
Well what about programing language '[' for embedded machines. :)
PS. The only other compiled language I like is PL/516 but I never used it
for getting closer to the bare machine. 8K words or 16 K(bytes) really makes
you think just what features you use with any programing language you develop.
Ben alias woodelf