Of course I am aware of that. The POWER 5 CPU even got BCD floating point arithmetic on chip. And - hey - the 6502 (Apple II, Atari 800, C=64) had BCD arithmetic. They all have - because it is important!
And that is the whole point of my post. A compiler with build in BCD arithmetic - like Ada, Cobol and PL/1 can make use those instructions far better then a compiler which only has a BCD add on in form of a library. And the reason is that a library - once compiled - can not run true the optimiser any more. And it is not the fault of the compiler vendors it's a problem of the standardisation bodies which designed the language itself.
But note that GNU C is getting Decimal floating point as well - build in not as a library:
Anything Cobol can do, any other language can do as well.
BCD arithmetic? Build in! Not by a library. Mainframes usually have BCD arithmetic on CPU Level and with a library you loose opportunity for optimisation.
Apart from COBOL I only know of PL/1 and Ada which have BCD arithmetic build in. Ahh, and the IBM mainframe C compiler - which is a rather special kind of beast.
Total Teraflops - that's a floating-point measurement. Not much floating point done in a database search - apart from the google rating and calculating the search speed pre haps.
OK, no modern operating systems for modern processors use more than 2 rings.
So you consider a 39 year old system more modern then a 28 year old system? Ok, Unix had more face lifts done so if you look at the GUI of a current Unix it look more fresh.
When was the last time OS/2 or VMS made a new release?
VMS - "Latest stable release OpenVMS 8.3-1H1/ October 25, 2007". It is still used for high integrity systems. There are quite a few tools in the high integrity world which the low integrity world considers long dead. And you know what: If the low integrity world would sometimes have a look at those tools they might learn how to create less bug ridden systems.
Though I'll give you that VMS has a lot of stuff that Unix simply can't ever have because Unix was designed off an entirely different basis.
More importantly: If UNIX do get some of those hight integrity features bolted on (ACL, extended attributes, POSIX capabilities spring to mind) they are generally not used - usually because of backward comparability concerns.
I remembers Brams dismissive reply when the communities asked for ACL support in Vim. If the standard editor (most system don't have a dedicated vi any more) won't support ACS - who does - who will.
This is why I like my Mac - at least Apple does use all those nice new extras.
Actually OS/2 used ring 2 for privileged DLLs and VMS used 4 rings for all sorts of stuff - ever since the VAX that is because even the VAX had 4 rings. But then VMS is 10 years younger then UNIX and offers a lot of stuff UNIX still hasn't got.
So there are operating systems which uses more then 2 rings.
Yes it does. They had great ideas at that time but not the cpu-power to make them real. Which is rather sad as lesser ideas needing less cpu-power made it and still haunt us even true we now do have the needed cpu-power.
On the other hand: with the aid of a library you can teach any language any trick. You can make for example C object orientated (Gtk and CORBA spring to my mind). Does that make C an object orientated language? Or would C become an object orientated language if Gtk was added to the upcoming C 200x [1] standard?
By your rationale the answer would be: Yes! Scary thought...
Martin
[1] I boldly assume that ISO finished before 2010.
Learning the language was easy enough. Ok, the STL was not in existence at the time - but that would be learning the library.
Of course learning all the little titbits to the point of hating K&R took far longer. Note that the stuff I hate about C++ come mostly from the C heritage.
After that I switched to Ada. And that too took only a fortnight for the language - that's including funky stuff like representation clauses.
I can't see C++ being functional. There might be a library to add functional programming - but the language itself: no.
And yes, C++ is pointer driven - especially with the very low level implementation of arrays. And no, vector is feature of the STL library not the C++ language.
Swiss German is a spoken only language [1], the Swiss write standard German [2]. And the LHC is in French spoken part of Switzerland and therefore the official project languages for the LHC are English and French.
[1] Meaning: There are no official spelling rules and if one wants to write down Swiss German anyway one has to make up spelling on the fly. [2] http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Standard_German
Actually OS/2 version 3.0 (kernel version, not marketing version) was supposed to be more then NT. OS/2 Version 3.0 was supposed to feature what today is called a hypervisor which would allow for multiple OSs to be loaded at the same time. At the time talk was to load OS/2, Windows, AIX and DOS concurrently.
But then M$ grabbed some former digital VMS developers, tool there share of the joint OS/2 venture and created NT.
True - only OS X is indeed Mac OS 10. However there are other examples - Solaris 10 (kernel 2.10) and OS/2 Warp 3 and 4 (kernel version 2.3 and 2.4) come to my mind here.
But is there any one Tool/Game which does all of them in one? It is not individual features which where patented but the combination of all of them in one single tool.
So in fact: apart from a few direct Dock clones (Rocketdock, Cairodock, etc) no other application or tool is affected.
Ok 1987 the Dock had not yet got it's famous magnification function, which is part of the patent. But then I doubt Amidock had/has a magnification function either. So you don't even play in the same liga.
Ok I should not read the threat bottom up. Anyway - search for OS/2 and read my other posts. Or I just copy it for you:
I used the Toolbar on OS/2 quite a lot. It did not have, for example, a magnification function. Also the Dock combines both the features of the Launchbar and the Minimized Windows window.
So, no, OS/2 did not have a Dock. It had two separate tools which provided some but not all of the functionality.
Slashdot Mirror
Of course I am aware of that. The POWER 5 CPU even got BCD floating point arithmetic on chip. And - hey - the 6502 (Apple II, Atari 800, C=64) had BCD arithmetic. They all have - because it is important!
And that is the whole point of my post. A compiler with build in BCD arithmetic - like Ada, Cobol and PL/1 can make use those instructions far better then a compiler which only has a BCD add on in form of a library. And the reason is that a library - once compiled - can not run true the optimiser any more. And it is not the fault of the compiler vendors it's a problem of the standardisation bodies which designed the language itself.
But note that GNU C is getting Decimal floating point as well - build in not as a library:
http://gcc.gnu.org/onlinedocs/gcc-4.2.4/gcc/Decimal-Float.html
Problem is: Financial institution prefer decimal fixed point.
Add it's an extension only available to GNU C.
Martin
Communication between various system.
Too bad it's no longer compatible with the on-tape format you wrote it for!
Well Ada has representation clauses for that:
http://www.adaic.com/standards/05rm/html/RM-13-5-1.html#I4559
But then Ada programmers are even more difficult to come by :-( .
Anything Cobol can do, any other language can do as well.
BCD arithmetic? Build in! Not by a library. Mainframes usually have BCD arithmetic on CPU Level and with a library you loose opportunity for optimisation.
Apart from COBOL I only know of PL/1 and Ada which have BCD arithmetic build in. Ahh, and the IBM mainframe C compiler - which is a rather special kind of beast.
Not as far as I know and actually with the so called "hypervisor mode" we now have 5 rings of operation in x86 architecture:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ring_(computer_security)
Total Teraflops - that's a floating-point measurement. Not much floating point done in a database search - apart from the google rating and calculating the search speed pre haps.
OK, no modern operating systems for modern processors use more than 2 rings.
So you consider a 39 year old system more modern then a 28 year old system? Ok, Unix had more face lifts done so if you look at the GUI of a current Unix it look more fresh.
When was the last time OS/2 or VMS made a new release?
VMS - "Latest stable release OpenVMS 8.3-1H1/ October 25, 2007". It is still used for high integrity systems. There are quite a few tools in the high integrity world which the low integrity world considers long dead. And you know what: If the low integrity world would sometimes have a look at those tools they might learn how to create less bug ridden systems.
Though I'll give you that VMS has a lot of stuff that Unix simply can't ever have because Unix was designed off an entirely different basis.
More importantly: If UNIX do get some of those hight integrity features bolted on (ACL, extended attributes, POSIX capabilities spring to mind) they are generally not used - usually because of backward comparability concerns.
I remembers Brams dismissive reply when the communities asked for ACL support in Vim. If the standard editor (most system don't have a dedicated vi any more) won't support ACS - who does - who will.
This is why I like my Mac - at least Apple does use all those nice new extras.
Martin
Actually OS/2 used ring 2 for privileged DLLs and VMS used 4 rings for all sorts of stuff - ever since the VAX that is because even the VAX had 4 rings. But then VMS is 10 years younger then UNIX and offers a lot of stuff UNIX still hasn't got.
So there are operating systems which uses more then 2 rings.
Martin
Yes it does. They had great ideas at that time but not the cpu-power to make them real. Which is rather sad as lesser ideas needing less cpu-power made it and still haunt us even true we now do have the needed cpu-power.
Martin
Have you considered that modern CPU have more then 2 privilege levels?
First: I spoke about good programmers not average.
Second: C++ is in indeed the exception which break the rule. C++ is indeed incredibly difficult to learn in full.
The real danger is that anyone can pick up the basics in no time.
On the other hand: with the aid of a library you can teach any language any trick. You can make for example C object orientated (Gtk and CORBA spring to my mind). Does that make C an object orientated language? Or would C become an object orientated language if Gtk was added to the upcoming C 200x [1] standard?
By your rationale the answer would be: Yes! Scary thought...
Martin
[1] I boldly assume that ISO finished before 2010.
Learning the language was easy enough. Ok, the STL was not in existence at the time - but that would be learning the library.
Of course learning all the little titbits to the point of hating K&R took far longer. Note that the stuff I hate about C++ come mostly from the C heritage.
After that I switched to Ada. And that too took only a fortnight for the language - that's including funky stuff like representation clauses.
Martin
I can't see C++ being functional. There might be a library to add functional programming - but the language itself: no.
And yes, C++ is pointer driven - especially with the very low level implementation of arrays. And no, vector is feature of the STL library not the C++ language.
Right on! A good programmer will learn any programming language in a fortnight. But sadly average programers don't.
Swiss German is a spoken only language [1], the Swiss write standard German [2]. And the LHC is in French spoken part of Switzerland and therefore the official project languages for the LHC are English and French.
[1] Meaning: There are no official spelling rules and if one wants to write down Swiss German anyway one has to make up spelling on the fly.
[2] http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Standard_German
What do you thing a Snow Leopard does with a poodle?
Actually OS/2 version 3.0 (kernel version, not marketing version) was supposed to be more then NT. OS/2 Version 3.0 was supposed to feature what today is called a hypervisor which would allow for multiple OSs to be loaded at the same time. At the time talk was to load OS/2, Windows, AIX and DOS concurrently.
But then M$ grabbed some former digital VMS developers, tool there share of the joint OS/2 venture and created NT.
True - only OS X is indeed Mac OS 10. However there are other examples - Solaris 10 (kernel 2.10) and OS/2 Warp 3 and 4 (kernel version 2.3 and 2.4) come to my mind here.
Nothing new here really, marketing always start to exaggerate the version number when no mayor changes happen any more.
OS/2 Warp 3 had kernel version 2.3
OS/2 Warp 4 had kernel version 2.4
And 2.x they where (the planned 3.x was supposed to feature what today is called a hypervisor).
Solaris won't mention the mayor version for ages - still stuck at 2.x as nothing fundamental new happen any more.
Only new to windows is the adding factor: 6 + 1 = 7. So my guess is that Windows 8 will be kernel version 6.2 ;-)
Yes - because only Docks with magnification are patented.
But is there any one Tool/Game which does all of them in one? It is not individual features which where patented but the combination of all of them in one single tool.
So in fact: apart from a few direct Dock clones (Rocketdock, Cairodock, etc) no other application or tool is affected.
... unless they have a magnification function as well.
The Dock is from 1987 - so you loose.
Ok 1987 the Dock had not yet got it's famous magnification function, which is part of the patent. But then I doubt Amidock had/has a magnification function either. So you don't even play in the same liga.
Ok I should not read the threat bottom up. Anyway - search for OS/2 and read my other posts. Or I just copy it for you:
I used the Toolbar on OS/2 quite a lot. It did not have, for example, a magnification function. Also the Dock combines both the features of the Launchbar and the Minimized Windows window.
So, no, OS/2 did not have a Dock. It had two separate tools which provided some but not all of the functionality.