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Date:	Sun, 5 Jan 2003 08:05:37 PST8
From:	"Lynn H. Maxson" <lmaxson@pacbell.net >
Reply-To:	scoug-programming@scoug.com
To:	< "scoug-programming@scoug.com" > scoug-programming@scoug.com >
Subject:	SCOUG-Programming: Re: ASK.exe ?

Content Type: text/plain

Peter,

I am somewhat over my pique that after pressuring me to give
a presentation you didn't even bother to show up...probably
offering some excuse about SD in-laws. I thought I might
humble myself by going to the UNIX to OS/2 porting URL
without questioning why anyone would want to port such an
application in the first place. I got bogged down in the
document even though it offered an extreme form of proof
positive of the overly complicated methods and software that
face any programmer wannabe. Having no idea of the
purpose of either ASK.cmd or the nonexisting ASK.exe, at
least Dallas's one suggestion about converting it to PL/I made
sense. That thought appealed to me relative to the porting
URL.

I do have this feeling that source code should be readable to
non-programmers. At least they should be able to follow the
logic and mentally emulate the logical expressions. Frankly
REXX leaves me cold when it comes to readability. I can
easily understand why people used to a universe of filter
sequences have met the challenge of understanding it as a
process.

Look porting UNIX apps to OS/2 is no more difficult than
porting UNIX apps from one UNIX OS to another. You had an
homungously labor-, money-, and time-expensive attempt to
ease this task with the Open Systems Foundation (OSF) effort.
It's only when you get into UNIX and C that you begin to
understand the very narrow definition of portability
(compiler-only) espoused by Kernighan and Ritchie.

So if this ASK thingee is open source, I would be more than
happy to assist in converting it to PL/I along with all the
enhancements you seem to be seeking. Maybe we could write
a C2PLI translator and replace the entire porting URL with a
"use this" aid.

I do think we could use a good open source editor with a PM
interface. We could add syntax checking with coloration of
source. Then we could add semantic checking providing the
function mentioned in the URL for ctags. We could drop the
compiler restriction on the programming language that
necessitates have two forms of procedures (internal and
external), leaving us only with external. That would allow us
to submit an unordered set of procedures on input which the
software could order based on internal reference patterns.

That same process would also allow us to generate multiple
object modules from the same set of unordered input as a
single unit of work. We could do this by incorporating the
first stage of the logic engine used in logic programming to
perform the completeness proof complete with full
backtracking. From the results of the completeness proof, the
now organized source, we could produce any of the outputs
now produced by CASE tools (UML, dataflows, structure
charts, etc.)

If in addition to the existing code generation for compiled
execution we added that necessary for interpretive execution,
we could as a user option offer a choice of either. Having the
interpretive execution would allow use to use the second
stage of the logic programming proof process to do an
exhaustive true/false test of any "marked" segment of the
organized source. If we use predicate instead of clausal logic,
this means the software would automatically enumerate all
possible data combinations as test input.

In the end you have a single tool with a single interface in a
single language with all desired visual outputs along with
interpretive execution. When everything finally looks like it is
ready, then you simply select a compiled execution option.

No make, no link, no sift, no dozens of other separately
executable UNIX aberrations. Just something with readable
source that presents less of a learning challenge to a
programming wannabe. To top it off portability will never
arise as an issue.

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