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Date: Thu, 8 Aug 2002 11:37:49 +0100
From: "John P. Looney" <valen@tuatha.org>
To: ilug@linux.ie
Subject: Re: [ILUG] slashdot EW Dijkstra humor
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On Thu, Aug 08, 2002 at 11:27:59AM +0100, wintermute mentioned:
> Interesting. I've always wondered about things 'considered' to be bad. 
> Example the GOTO, most languages support a goto of some sort, so are gotos really bad?

 Yes. Especially in the languages he was talking about - C, Pascal and
Assembler. Goto's can be used well; there are a few used in the kernel
code to improve efficency. They are almost required in some languages
(like C) where 'break' or 'continue' can't be told how many loops/switches
to break out of.

 But, in general, goto's make a mess of code.

> Is a loop or a recursive call actually any better than a goto 
> or is the goto used as a kind of common enemy of 
> programming syntax
> to make sure people use loops or recursion?
> <<To iterate is human, to recurse divine>>

 Recursion is only truely useful if you have an infinite stack. People
that think they have an infinite stack shouldn't be let near a compiler.

> Kind of makes you wonder about things considered to be 'good'.  For
> example people bang on about polymorphism, but is there actually any
> advantage in using an overloaded function based on class inheritance?

 I don't care, to be honest.

Kate


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