Re: Did I write a good (efficient) program?

On Mon, 31 Mar 2008 12:10:23 -0700 (PDT), Richard <riplin@[EMAIL PROTECTED]
>
wrote:

>On Mar 31, 1:44 pm, Robert <n...@[EMAIL PROTECTED]
> wrote:
>>
>> Efficient is Cobolese for fast. In the Good Old Days we had to hold the
machine's hand,
>> showing it how to go fast. Concern for speed became THE criteria
driving design.
>
>No. Often saving space was just as big a concern. Fitting the client's
>product and customer files onto one 4 MegaByte disk drive was as
>im****tant as having the daily invoice run take less than 24 hours.

I would think you'd oppose arbitrary size limits such as fixed length
arrays.

>> As
>> machines got faster, we kept doing it out of habit and because no one
told us to stop. We
>> now program as though the year is still 1973,
>
>Who are the 'we' that you speak of ?  Are you making another of your
>infamous 'universal truths' about 'all Cobol programmers', or is it
>just yourself that is a 'royal wee'.

'We' refers to those who pre-optimize code before there is evidence it
needs to be
optimized. For instance, defining fixed length strings and arrays because
they believe
variable length is too slow. That came out during a recent discussion
about ODO.

>> ignoring the fact that the Pentium 4 on our
>> desktop is 2,000 times the speed of a 370/158.
>
>Well, it does seem that you were alone in wanting to save a few
>nanoseconds on SEARCH ALL. You previously wanted to convince others to
>use pointer based lists because you claimed they were faster than
>tables (when my testing showed them not to be).

The principal advantage of lists over arrays is no practical limit on
size. They can grow
to millions of entries. Other advantages are variable length entries (e.g.
words) and the
ability to splice a new entry into the middle. 

>It may well be that you program "as though the year is still 1973",
>but others may not be doing so.

In 1973 everything (except files) was fixed length. We used fixed length
strings, numbers,
arrays, records and blocks in files. Now, outside Cobol, most things are
variable length.
The next Cobol standard proposes adding 'any length' data items and
arrays. The Old Guard
are opposed.