[plug] [why not staroffice]

[Hook]

Well, personally, probably not.  These days I'd grab a database, write Perl
scripts, use an apache web server and run the whole thing as a web
application.  C's main issue is development time - the code can be fast, but
it takes longer to develop (and debug) than something like (say) Perl.
OTOH, Perl may not be appropriate for the application that you're building.
There aren't may hard and fast rules I'm afraid.

Hook


> Great to hear you using C for whole program. No doubt that C is greased
> lighting. But network traffic seems to me to be very much domain of
sysadmins
> whom I think use C all the time for patching and the like, but would you
sit
> down and write a general ledger program for instance in C knowing that
most of
> the work is going to revolve around master file, transaction file
databases?
>
> Hook wrote:
>
> > Not true (about the long programs).  C is (OK, *can be*) fast and pretty
> > efficient. I'm currently writing a network traffic accounting system in
C
> > largely because it's considerably faster than any of the limited number
of
> > other choices.
> >
> > Portability is an issue with any language. You can write portable C with
> > considerable effort, and you can write C that is pretty much tied into
the
> > platform that you're developing on. Usually, the core of any program can
be
> > made portable, it's the interfaces to the external world that give
trouble
> > (i.e. the differences between X and the MickeySoft equivalent).
> >
> > Paul
> >
> > > Thanks for the feedback on programming - this is certainly an active
> > group.
> > > I too have found that C does not handle strings as well as some other
> > languages,
> > > but I have heard from nerds that C is very good for writing languages,
and
> > for
> > > operating systems. I reason that most sysadmins must use C a lot for
> > patches and
> > > the like, but that nobody would actually sit down and write a long
program
> > in C.
> > > Am I right in thinking this?
> > > But I also find that most languages look very like C to me with the
> > variable
> > > initialisations, include libraries and the like - also the layout of
the
> > source
> > > code is very much like C.
> > > I heard that unix itself was written in C, so I reason that everybody
> > should know
> > > a bit of C. Also it is not high level but yet not low level like
> > assembler.
> > > Perhaps mid level, which means that you have to do a lot of lines of
code
> > to come
> > > up with the same outcome as yo could with much less coding in Pascal?
Even
> > though
> > > they say C is very portable I found code which would compile and run
under
> > turbo C
> > > would not do so on microsof C. Also would not compile on GC, so I am
> > wondering
> > > just how portable it is?
>
>
>
>
>