🚀 go-pugleaf

>Well, if you write a FORTRAN interpreter in C, I don't see how you can
>say that FORTRAN is not a subset of C.  Precisely which "features of
>Fortran syntax" is C incapable of handling?  Or have I missed the
>point?   -- Darren

You have missed the point completely. If you can write a FORTRAN
interpreter in C, C is as powerful or more than FORTRAN. If you can
write a C interpreter in FORTRAN as well, they are equally powerful.
But that does not make FORTRAN a subset of C, (nor C a subset of
FORTRAN). 

If FORTRAN were a subset of C, any legal program in FORTRAN would be a
legal program in C. Not only that, they should have the same
semantics, although that becomes a difficult question when function
libraries are considered. From a purely syntactic point of view, I'm
pretty sure (although I don't know FORTRAN) that there are
constructions in FORTRAN that C's syntax could not generate.

Nonetheless, it has nothing to do with being able to write an
interpreter for one language in another. Most languages are equally
powerful. That is, any program you can write in one language you can
write in another, (even though it could be really difficult).

A language without any form of dynamic allocation is going to be weak,
(is FORTRAN like this?).

Dan
--
Daniel Mark Gessel                          Independent Software Consultant
Internet: gessel@cs.swarthmore.edu                   and Developer
I do not represent Swarthmore College (thank God).