Exceptions in C/C++

[Antoninus Twink]

A few weeks ago the group discussed topicality and whether they would
like it to change, and the overwhelming majority stated that they
wished the group to continue to restrict itself to K&R C and the
various ISO standards. If you wanted to loosen up the topicality
requirements of this group, that would have been a great time to make
yourself heard, but IIRC you did not do so. Even if you had taken
part, however, you would have been in the minority (as was I).

This is pretty breathtaking cynicism. Do you think anyone will really
fall for this "I'm a moderate, because I say so", when your actions in
this group (constant sniping, constant "you're off topic" posts) give
the lie to this claim day after day?

 

[Charlton Wilbur]

AT> This is pretty breathtaking cynicism. Do you think anyone will
AT> really fall for this "I'm a moderate, because I say so", when
AT> your actions in this group (constant sniping, constant "you're
AT> off topic" posts) give the lie to this claim day after day?

Whether Mr Heathfield is "moderate" or "conservative" or "liberal" in
his view on topicality is largely irrelevant; there *was* a lengthy
thread, where Mr Heathfield asked the contributors to the group what
they preferred to be topical. Considered on a basis of one poster,
one vote, the consensus of the group is almost overwhelmingly in favor
of the narrowly-defined topicality of K&R and ISO C. Further, it was
conducted in public, so you can go back and read the votes and the
rationales behind them.

I recommend you search for it on Google Groups; you might be
enlightened.

Charlton

 

[Antoninus Twink]

AT> This is pretty breathtaking cynicism. Do you think anyone will
AT> really fall for this "I'm a moderate, because I say so", when
AT> your actions in this group (constant sniping, constant "you're
AT> off topic" posts) give the lie to this claim day after day?

Whether Mr Heathfield is "moderate" or "conservative" or "liberal" in
his view on topicality is largely irrelevant; there *was* a lengthy
thread, where Mr Heathfield asked the contributors to the group what
they preferred to be topical. Considered on a basis of one poster,
one vote, the consensus of the group is almost overwhelmingly in favor
of the narrowly-defined topicality of K&R and ISO C. Further, it was
conducted in public, so you can go back and read the votes and the
rationales behind them.

I recommend you search for it on Google Groups; you might be
enlightened.

Perhaps you should search Google Groups yourself: here is a good example
of a thread <http://tinyurl.com/2rpx5z> where Heathfield's true colors
are well and truly shown.

 

[Charlton Wilbur]

AT> Perhaps you should search Google Groups yourself: here is a
AT> good example of a thread <http://tinyurl.com/2rpx5z> where
AT> Heathfield's true colors are well and truly shown.

I've been participating in this newsgroup for over a decade, long
enough to remember the Scott Nuds and Portable ASM debacle; I don't
think I need an anonymous troll telling me what to think about
regulars of long standing.

Further, why are you trying to make this a personal attack on Mr
Heathfield? The limits on topicality that he encourages are the ones
supported by the vast majority of people who bothered to respond to
that thread, started by the same Mr Heathfield in response to
criticisms like yours that his view of topicality was too narrow.

Charlton

 

[CBFalconer]

Whether Mr Heathfield is "moderate" or "conservative" or "liberal"
in his view on topicality is largely irrelevant; there *was* a
lengthy thread, where Mr Heathfield asked the contributors to the
group what they preferred to be topical. Considered on a basis of
one poster, one vote, the consensus of the group is almost
overwhelmingly in favor of the narrowly-defined topicality of K&R
and ISO C. Further, it was conducted in public, so you can go
back and read the votes and the rationales behind them.

I recommend you search for it on Google Groups; you might be
enlightened.

This is a more than adequate response for the general doubter.
However Mr. Twink is a known troll.

 

[rosewater]

I am saying that it should be possible to program in C using
a normal software engineering environment, i.e. an environment
where things like exceptions are there, an environment where
you can do things like containers and bound checked
arrays if you wish.

Hey, dumb ass, guess what? You get get this "normal software
engineering environment" any day of the week by the simple expedient
of using C++ or Java.

Do you think anyone in this group is interesting in your constant
attacks on standard C? Why don't you just get out of our hair and use
a programming language that suits you better.

It seems to be a vicious circle with you. You aren't really happy with
C, so you go off and get tied up with your stupid compiler extensions,
then this makes you care even less about C, and so it goes on.

No one gives a flying firkin about your exceptions and your bounds-
checked arrays. We come here to discuss C.

All those things are applications of a *single* enhancement:
operator overloading.

For enhancement, read misfeature leading to bloat and pointless
complexity. Once again, C++ is there if you want it - go drown
yourself in its "enhancements".

There is a misunderstanding if you think I want to add all those things
to the language. That is surely NOT the case. Those things can be done
if we add operator overloading, but they need not be in all
implementations, and I have always said that this enhancements are
optional in the sense that you do not need to use them, you can still
program as before with these enhancements there.

Another things is the subject of this thread, i.e. exceptions.

Exceptions are needed in C specially in embedded systems
where a reasonable handling of errors and traps is REQUIRED!

Utter garbage. You have no clue about embedded programming.

The argumentation of many people here (not Heathfield since
I do not recall any argument from that person, just "off topic", etc)
is that error handling should be done manually, i.e. it is up to the
programmer to catch all possible exceptions and be held responsible for
all routines he calls. If any of those traps, the application
fails and that is all.

This is just not acceptable in many environments.

Please let's argument within the technical context

Yeah, right. Unfortunately, you're incapable of technical argument.

 

[jacob navia]

Hey, dumb ass, guess what?

[snip]

This is the only level of discussion that the "regulars" are able to
master.

 

[Kenny McCormack]

This is pretty breathtaking cynicism. Do you think anyone will really
fall for this "I'm a moderate, because I say so", when your actions in
this group (constant sniping, constant "you're off topic" posts) give
the lie to this claim day after day?

Yes, apparently he does.

Yes, mindboggling.

 

[Richard]

AT> Perhaps you should search Google Groups yourself: here is a
AT> good example of a thread <http://tinyurl.com/2rpx5z> where
AT> Heathfield's true colors are well and truly shown.

I've been participating in this newsgroup for over a decade, long
enough to remember the Scott Nuds and Portable ASM debacle; I don't
think I need an anonymous troll telling me what to think about
regulars of long standing.

Further, why are you trying to make this a personal attack on Mr
Heathfield? The limits on topicality that he encourages are the ones
supported by the vast majority of people who bothered to respond to
that thread, started by the same Mr Heathfield in response to
criticisms like yours that his view of topicality was too narrow.

Charlton

Mr Heathfield is undoubtedly very knowledgeable about c89. He is
however unwilling to discuss other standards as he has shown recently
while pretending Jacob's code was un-compilable.

He has no more say in what is posted to this NG than any one else. If
people post C related posts then this is a good resource for people who
might be able to help. As was made very clear in the founding
charter. And to deny that is what it was is plain ridiculous.

Often there are not dedicated NGs elsewhere. A little bit of flexibility
is the key to many things in life. If you don't like it, then ignore it
or kill file the thread or the originating poster or the person who
replies. Or *gasp* just mark it as read. if others post a sensible reply
then some good has come from the group. Certainly more good than you or
Heathfield puffing our your chests and telling everyone how you have no
intention of helping because the Q is what YOU deem as Off Topic.

I suspect that most reasonable posters did not take part in Heathfield's
little poll - primarily because they have better things to do than
nitpick and play word games with the clique. I know that I kill any
thread where Mr Heathfield, Mr McIntyre or Mr CBFalconer start their
little games of oneupmanship.

What do I mean by related?

Easy. Consider someone posting here for the resident experts views on
the best cross platform IDE for developing C. Strongly C related. There
are many people here who are experienced in just this area. Lovely.

If that kind of thing leads to RH departing then more fool him. It is
proven daily in real life that there is always someone else there to
pick up the reigns.

 

[Mark McIntyre]

yes it was:

You can repeat this as often as you like, and requote the original mail
from 1985 or whenever till you're blue in the face, but that does not
make your opinion into a fact.

There is no vote nor document that I know of doing that, this is YOUR
OPINION and that's all.

No, its the opinion of the readers of this group.

Oh, and by the way there was an informal vote recently. Your position lost.

"... the planet's formeots experts"

Assuming your typo should read "foremost", yes.

WOW

And as usual you disregard the opinion of experts.

Well, after that page of self publicity I will zap
mind you?

I did not say I was one of the planet's formost experts, but thanks all
the same for the complement.

 

[Mark McIntyre]

jacob navia wrote:

(stuff)

Have you noticed that when you _stick to talking about C_, your opinion
is valued?

Have you noticed that when you waste everyone's time gibbering on and on
and on about how everyone hates you and how you're misunderstood, and
how you're right and the rest of the world is wrong, people increasingly
treat you like an idiot?

 

[Mark McIntyre]

He has surely a group of people behind him that
do not hesitate to start insulting anyone
that doesn't agree with them.

Jacob, thats a bare-faced lie. You owe an apology to a great many people.

 

[CBFalconer]

Hey, dumb ass, guess what?

[snip]

This is the only level of discussion that the "regulars" are able
to master.

Well, if you insist on classifying plonked trolls as 'regulars'.

 

[Mark McIntyre]

WORD GAMES.

If you haven't learned by now that words have meanings and context, and
that meanings and contexts are important, then you have a problem. That
said, it woudl explain a lot about why you find such difficulty in
contributing usefully to CLC.

And always refusing any discussion of the issues at hand.

This is an outright lie however.

When we discussed this in comp.std.c he could only master apityful
post where he tried to insult me/ridiculing my arguments without
proposing anything of substantial value.

Feel free to post a substantiating link, or to apologise for making a
false statement.

 

[Richard]

You can repeat this as often as you like, and requote the original
mail from 1985 or whenever till you're blue in the face, but that does
not make your opinion into a fact.

The post is not an opinion. It is however a fact. And much more of a
fact than your own opinion is.

No, its the opinion of the readers of this group.

No it is not. It is the opinion of some of the readers. A vocal minority.

 

[jacob navia]

The post is not an opinion. It is however a fact. And much more of a
fact than your own opinion is.

The whole tone of the post is exactly that of a founding (charter)
document.

1) The message reports the results of a previous discussion about
the proposition to create a C discussion group
2) The message makes clear the main topics that should concern the
newly created group.

This is the same process as we have today, excepting that in those
times it wasn't necessary to vote, and the fact that nobody opposed
such a group was considered enough.

 

[Mark McIntyre]

The whole tone of the post is exactly that of a founding (charter)
document.

Nevertheless it still is _not_ a Charter. The word has a specific
meaning in usenet. And by the way, a Charter is not what founds a
newsgroup, it is what defines its topic.

This is the same process as we have today, excepting that in those
times it wasn't necessary to vote, and the fact that nobody opposed
such a group was considered enough.

To create it? Yes. To define and refine its topic over the intervening
20+ years? No.

Its useless to argue with you however. You will never admit or accept
that the majority of posters here disagree with you, and that your
interpretation of decades-old history is both wrong and irrelevant. When
o when will you grow up?

 

[Antoninus Twink]

AT> Perhaps you should search Google Groups yourself: here is a
AT> good example of a thread <http://tinyurl.com/2rpx5z> where
AT> Heathfield's true colors are well and truly shown.

I've been participating in this newsgroup for over a decade, long
enough to remember the Scott Nuds and Portable ASM debacle; I don't
think I need an anonymous troll telling me what to think about
regulars of long standing.

I think you should try to shake off the spell Heathfield casts over
people and look at the evidence. In the thread linked to above, here is
a direct quote: "If we didn't defend topicality, the S/N ratio would be
much lower than it currently is. ... People who continually ignore the
topicality of this group /do/ get yelled at, of course, and IMHO quite
rightly." Are these the words of a topicality moderate, or of a zealot
and a net-nanny?

Further, why are you trying to make this a personal attack on Mr
Heathfield? The limits on topicality that he encourages are the ones
supported by the vast majority of people who bothered to respond to
that thread, started by the same Mr Heathfield in response to
criticisms like yours that his view of topicality was too narrow.

Well, Heathfield knows all about personal attacks. We now know that he
has been using sock puppets to carry out the nastiest elements of his
vendetta against Jacob Navia - his strategy is obviously to try to
eliminate Jacob, who might otherwise be a counterbalance to his
ultra-narrow view of topicality.

Heathfield exerts such a powerful effect over the group because he has a
great deal of personal charisma. This isn't necessarily a good thing -
we can all think of a German leader from the last century who was
extremely charismatic but did some terrible things. (It's an interesting
coincidence that the target of Heathfield's persecution has a Jewish
name...)

 

[Kenny McCormack]

When o when will you grow up?

Oh, the irony...

 

[Charlton Wilbur]

AT> Well, Heathfield knows all about personal attacks. We now know
AT> that he has been using sock puppets to carry out the nastiest
AT> elements of his vendetta against Jacob Navia - his strategy is
AT> obviously to try to eliminate Jacob, who might otherwise be a
AT> counterbalance to his ultra-narrow view of topicality.

First: "we" know no such thing about sock puppets; if you want this
allegation to be taken seriously, you need to provide evidence.

Second: Jacob Navia does a sufficient job of eliminating himself,
because it is impossible to have any sort of discussion with him if
you disagree with him.

AT> Heathfield exerts such a powerful effect over the group
AT> because he has a great deal of personal charisma. This isn't
AT> necessarily a good thing - we can all think of a German leader
AT> from the last century who was extremely charismatic but did
AT> some terrible things. (It's an interesting coincidence that
AT> the target of Heathfield's persecution has a Jewish name...)

Third: Mr Heathfield exerts a powerful effect because he's correct; if
he were wrong as often as Mr Navia is, and as rude when corrected,
he'd get similar treatment.

Fourth: introducing comparisons to Hitler and allegations of
anti-Semitism is ungrounded and inflammatory.

Charlton