Messages in this thread | | | Date | Mon, 24 Apr 2006 19:58:37 -0700 | From | "marty fouts" <> | Subject | Re: C++ pushback |
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On 4/24/06, linux-os (Dick Johnson) <linux-os@analogic.com> wrote:
> It is possible to compromise a bit and use a slightly higher-level > procedural language called C. One loses control of everything with > any other language. Note that before C was invented, all operating > system code was written in assembly.
Even if by "operating system" you mean kernel, this turns out not to be true. Operating systems written in other 'moderate-level' languages such as Fortran predate C. (Once upon a time, a company called Pr1me had an OS called PrimeOS, written in Fortran.)
My all time favorite OS, RSTS/E, was largely written in a Dec variant of BASIC, called BASIC-PLUS.
High level languages have been invented just for writing OSes (BLISS) and OSes have been successfully written in a LISP, PL/1, and even C++. The last OS I worked on was almost entirely in C++ and worked ok.
What you don't want to do is add a new language to a system that was largely written in another language. It's tempting to add C++ to a large C system because C and C++ are similar, but it's almost always a disaster, because you organize large systems much differently if you design them for C++. - To unsubscribe from this list: send the line "unsubscribe linux-kernel" in the body of a message to majordomo@vger.kernel.org More majordomo info at http://vger.kernel.org/majordomo-info.html Please read the FAQ at http://www.tux.org/lkml/
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