🚀 go-pugleaf

In article <dbell-1104961159050001@wholder2.cts.com> dbell@shvn.com (Doug Bell) writes:

> And in environments
>where a large product is being produced for relatively few users, such as
>American Express' internal card purchase authorization system, the
>economics of the situation support the extra computing resources often
>required by a highly generalized language if it reduces the cost to
>implement.  To what extent a generalized language or a 4GL language
>reduces the cost of implementation is debatable, but certainly a case can
>be made for this.

It is sometimes (granted, rarely) not simply a question of reducing
implementation cost or time-to-market, but getting there at all.
There are real complexity barriers which can be very difficult to 
break through with conventional tools.  These barriers don't go 
away once a product is released, but carry over into maintenance
and enhancement also.

Not quite sure how 4GL crept in there.  To me, 4GL is a long way
from being in the same category with languages like Lisp or Smalltalk. 

>Let's just say that to some extent, the answers a language *does* have
>must be relative to the impact of the software which results from it. 
>What other measure would you apply?

Define "impact."  A single application, for example the Amex system,
can have a tremendous impact without being very apparent to the
average person.  In a very real sense, it is one of the most widely 
used applications in existence.  But if you define "impact" as "sales 
in a general-use market," then I disagree.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
William D. Gooch
RothWell International
goochb@rwi.com
Texas liaison for the International Programmers Guild
For information on IPG, see http://www.ipgnet.com/ipghome.htm
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~