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Article View: comp.lang.misc
Article #38

Re: Copmaring Power (Expressivity) of Two Languages

#38
From: Amr Sabry
Date: Wed, 04 Nov 1992 14:40
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In article <1992Oct19.192241.8830@newshost.lanl.gov>, jlg@cochiti.lanl.gov (J. Giles) writes:
|> Oh.  Now I disagree with you even more.  For example, it is clear that
|> all high level languages can be translated into assembly (or they won't
|> work at all), and that assembly is less expressive (in a human-factors
|> sense).  To be sure, assembly allows you to do everything the machine
|> is capable of.  However, the ease of programming is not exactly the
|> best in the world.
|> 
|> Or, do you intend to define "expressiveness" as merely that raw,
|> hands-on control and not ease of use?

You are totally missing the point. First the definition is not mine
but a formal definition from the literature. Second, the definition I
mentioned does NOT imply that assembly is more expressive than any
language. Otherwise, would you care to show me a LOCAL translation
(without knowning the rest of the program) of the following Scheme
fragment into your favorite assembly language:

		(call/cc (lambda (k) k))

Compare this with the while loop example. A while-loop can be
translated to an equivalent repeat-loop WITHOUT knowing ANYTHING about
the rest of the program.

-- 
Amr Sabry				     	    sabry@cs.rice.edu
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From: sabry@rice.edu (Amr Sabry)
Subject: Re: Copmaring Power (Expressivity) of Two Languages
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References: <1992Oct17.191243.21215@cs.uoregon.edu> <BwDKKJ.J64@rice.edu> <BwDn65.Jy6@rice.edu> <1992Oct19.192241.8830@newshost.lanl.gov>
Date: Wed, 4 Nov 1992 14:40:21 GMT
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