Is Transcript's English orientation a plus or minus?

[Dar Scott]

On Tuesday, February 10, 2004, at 11:41 AM, jbv wrote:

> the association
> of Xtalk and C can lead to a tremendous power in high end
> projects, Rev & Xtalk being used to build top quality front
> ends (with unbeatable productivity & cost ratios) while C
> being used in externals for critical high end tasks (realtime
> 3D, data base access and many other industrial & scientific
> processes)...
>
I think this is a good point.  I use externals to get access to some OS 
capability and to control other processes, but it is reasonable to use 
externals for performance, too.  If I was doing a lot in the external, 
I would consider shifting to C++ and using the standard library, but 
since my current needs encourage me to keep the external simple and 
expose general capability to Transcript, I find much is still done in 
Transcript and the small external is programmed in C.  There have been 
exceptions to keeping externals small, especially in making authorized 
system changes the right way.

But I have paid my dues.  I have programmed in a zillion languages, 
high and low, in a zillion environments.  I am an experienced C 
programmer.  Programming in C has its pitfalls.  There is a cost for a 
programmer new to C to move in this direction.

Dar Scott