C's syntax (was Re: Python Formatted C Converter (PfCC))

[Grant Griffin]

Alex Martelli wrote:
> 
> "Grant Griffin" <not.this at seebelow.org> wrote in message
> news:39FB2080.D38CAD35 at seebelow.org...
>     [snip]
> > If you speak true words of wisdom on some subject, the words stand on
> > their own.
> 
> Oh, do they?  Even to a reader whose knowledge of the subject
> is infinitesimal?  How interesting!  So (supposing for the sake
> of argument you knew no Italian), you are somehow able (is
> it divine inspiration, ESP, or...?) to tell whether the following
> assertion, for example...:
> 
> "hyphenation in Italian is best performed algorithmically,
> given the strong regularity of the language's syllabification
> rules; trying to adapt to Italian hyphenation algorithms
> designed for other languages, adjusting only a data table
> to account for the language, is vastly sub-optimal"

I sure don't know what all that stuff means, but I gotta tell you that
it leaves me even more impressed with you than when you told us about
your extensive expertise in C.  <0.2 wink>

> is made up of "true words of wisdom"?  How, pray tell, do
> these words "stand on their own", when you have no basis
> on which to apply judgment?

I hope you realize the non-applicability of your example.  (If not, I
think there's a good chance the rest of us do. <wink>)  If, instead of
tangentializing about Italian, you were to make any well-reasoned and
insightful points about failings in C's syntax (any at all: honestly, we
get more curious each time you dodge the question!) then there's a very
good chance that most everyone here would understand (if not agree.) 
The reason is that nearly all of us here speak Italian...er, I
mean..."C".

But as long as we are impressing each other with stuff that doesn't
apply, let me try to return the favor and impress you with something you
may not know much about:

"When doing peoyte beading, it is imperitive to drop a bead whenever you
_can_ drop a bead; otherwise, the bead work will invariably become
flabby at the point at which the bead might have been dropped".

(what was the question? ;-)

> Are you _seriously_ claiming that a reader's ability to judge
> the worth of my words about Italian usage is not helped by
> knowing that I am a native speaker of Italian, have lived in
> Italy for most of my life, have co-authored with Tullio De
> Mauro (a prominent Italian linguist, currently the Minister
> for Education) a book on the results of computational
> linguistic studies applied to Italian, etc?

No.  He probably doesn't speak Italian.  (And I'm pretty sure I don't.
;-)  But would you argue that the proportion of people involved in
comp.lang.python who use and understand C is similar to the proportion
who speak Italian?  I wouldn't: it seems likely that nearly all
Pythoneers speak C, but very few speak Italian.  (Now if the language in
question were not "Italian" but "Dutch", that might be another
question...)

a-poor-analogy-proves-nothing-ly y'rs,

=g2
p.s.  I'm really impressed with that stuff about co-authoring with a
prominent Italian linguist, but I'm still gonna say that when I helped
Al Gore invent the Internet, that was even cooler.  <wink>
-- 
_____________________________________________________________________

Grant R. Griffin                                       g2 at dspguru.com
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