"Systems programming" (was: Language Niches (long))

[Grant Edwards]

On Mon, 30 Jul 2001 20:32:18 -0700, Brendan Hahn <bhahn at spam-spam.g0-away.com> wrote:

As long we're completely off-topic (Python-wise)...

>You can do kernel stuff in C++ on a lot of systems, but it's
>often more trouble than it's worth...kernel versions of the C++
>runtime can be very quirky.  NT is actually pretty nice for
>doing C++ drivers.

Now that you mention it, I knew that.  Not long ago I was
helping a guy try to decypher some C++ code in an NT driver.
[What a mess: there were local variables that shadowed instance
variables that shadowed global variables, and all of the
instance variables were accessed via cpp macros.  It was like
somebody was _trying_ to be obtuse.]

The question of how to write a Linux driver in C++ comes up
fairly regularly.  In theory it's possible as long as you don't
use features X,Y, and Z, and you include a set of kenel-mode runtime
support routines.  Nobody ever wants to try it badly enough.

>You could use Objective-C on the old NeXT systems -- Apple has
>switched to a C++ IO system, for better performance, but using
>a restricted subset of the language.  Haven't tried it yet but
>I think it'll be nice.

Is that in OS X?  I thought it was BSD under the hood?

>Forth is actually in very wide use, but at the sub-OS level --
>any Open Firmware system starts up running Forth, and if you
>want a boot driver for a new storage adapter, say, you write it
>in Forth and put it in ROM on the card.

That always sounded like a very elegant system -- though I've
never worked with it.

-- 
Grant Edwards                   grante             Yow!  I'm meditating on
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