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IBM Open Sources Object Rexx 216
dryeo writes "IBM has Open Sourced Object Rexx. IBM Announcement. Source code has been turned over to The Rexx Language Association under the Common Public Licence. Rexx is an interpreted language which has been included in platforms such as the Amiga, OS/2 and AIX, and most IBM mainframes. For a quick overview check out Rexx for everyone."
More info... (Score:5, Informative)
Where to download ?! (Score:2)
IBM's analysis to open software (Score:3, Insightful)
2. Doesn't benefit competitiors
3. Open
Re:IBM's analysis to open software (Score:3, Insightful)
Re:IBM's analysis to open software (Score:2, Funny)
Do what? open source some software so that their servers can get a good slashdotting?
Re:IBM's analysis to open software (Score:2)
Re:IBM's analysis to open software (Score:5, Informative)
Re:IBM's analysis to open software (Score:5, Insightful)
I think the main philosophy here is that IBM is not in the software business. It's not in the hardware business either. IBM is in the solutions business. That is, the hardware, OS, software, support and the whole enchilada that goes with it.
(Sure, IBM had its years with the PC, trying to dominate the retail market. But they failed at that, despite still making a pretty darn good laptop, they're not the force they once were.)
Out of this context of selling solutions.. it doesn't matter to them if the software is open source or not. Open source can even serve to increase their profit margins, saving them development costs.
IBM bought Transarc and open-sourced their AFS implementation (now OpenAFS).
Was that because it had no commercial value? I don't think so.. Transarc had made some money off it.
Rather, it was because it was a useful part of the solutions IBM offered. And they could make more money off it as such than selling it retail. (which I believe they still do, but it's hardly why they bought it)
Rexx, on the other hand.. Well, that's certainly a case of something they couldn't make money off to begin with.
Re:IBM's analysis to open software (Score:2)
Exactly how did they make more money from it, through OpenSourcing it, than selling it at retail?
Through providing "solutions" with it? How is the profitablitity based on the software, on part of the "solution", being OpenSource?
They can't be saving just on development costs, in the long run, they will be dependent on random strangers to fix things, its pretty easy
Re:IBM's analysis to open software (Score:3, Insightful)
That's the whole open-source development model for you. You may think you wouldn't want to depend on random strangers, but when a comunity builds up, these "random strangers" will be the experts. "Random strangers" contribute a vast amount of value to a huge number of projects.
Re:IBM's analysis to open software (Score:2)
Mandrake went through bankrupcty and is still going, which means they have to have something for income.
IBM is in the even better position not to rely on Open Source for it's products but as an option to and enhance their lines.
And Since it's Open Source if IBM finds a probelm they can fix it and publish back the changes so it won't happen elsewhere. That's the beauty of Open Source.
Re:IBM's analysis to open software (Score:2)
IBM is making copy machines now? Oh wait -- that's marketing jargon from a different product sector.
Quit saying "solutions" (Score:2)
About "Solutions" (Score:3, Informative)
Instead of offering a service that a customer will decide whether or not they need it, a solution offers everything to achieve the list of goals a client requires.
Re:Quit saying "solutions" (Score:3, Interesting)
Solutions is "they fix problems you have". But if you squint your eyes, you see that they create half of them. Here are some of the things you need IBM Global Services to solve for you
I'd poin
Re:IBM's analysis to open software (Score:2)
IMO Lotus Smart Suite would have made a better base for an OSS office suite than StarOffice (--> OpenOffice) with its all-in-one approach.
IBM could have at least open the file format readers/writers. I still have a lot Lotus files and I can't open/convert them on my Mac.
Re:IBM's analysis to open software (Score:4, Insightful)
Re:IBM's analysis to open software (Score:2)
But, I have no problem with their approach. I wish every company that had software laying around that they can no longer profit from would just open it up like this.
More open source software is always better, as long as it's not Microsoft Bob.
Re:IBM's analysis to open software (Score:2)
why would a IBM even consider giving away a product that they can sell for a profit? That's what they do: Sell software, hardware and support.
Do you expect Volvo to give away free cars or the Disney corporation to offer free weeks at Disneyland?
Contrary to Stallman's dogma, most people think selling software is just as ethical as giving it away.
A short list of IBM's contributions to Open Source (Score:5, Informative)
4758 Secure Coprocessor Driver for Linux
This project is a Linux device driver for the IBM 4758 PCI Cryptographic Coprocessor, which is a tamper-sensing and responding, programmable PCI card. It provides a highly secure subsystem in which data processing and cryptography can be performed.
ATM on Linux
ATM support for Linux is currently in pre-alpha stage. There is an experimental release, which supports raw ATM connections (PVCs and SVCs), IP over ATM, LAN emulation, MPOA, Arequipa, and some other goodies.
Abstract Machine Test Utility (AMTU) for Linux
Abstract Machine Test Utility (AMTU) is an administrative utility that checks whether the underlying protection mechanism of the hardware is being enforced. This is a requirement of the Controlled Access Protection Profile (CAPP) FTP_AMT.1.
Ananas Project: Summary
This is the source for Working XML, a column on developerWorks with companion project code that demonstrates the evolution of full-fledged XML applications. This is distributed under the artistic license.
Apache HTTP Server
The Apache project develops and maintains an open-source HTTP server for various modern desktop and server operating systems.
BlueHoc simulator
BlueHoc is a tool that predicts the performance of Bluetooth wireless hardware technologies. BlueHoc simulates the baseband and link layers of the Bluetooth specification.
COIN (Common Optimization INterface)
Developers can use Common Optimization INterface (COIN) to build optimization solutions. IBM mathematical optimization researchers opened the code they use in finding the optimal allocation of limited resources. The code has many applications in a variety of industries.
Channel Bonding
The Channel Bonding project works on methods to join multiple networks on Linux into a single logical network with higher bandwidth. The project team works with the Beowulf Ethernet Channel Bonding project, where bonding work began.
Consensus prototype
Consensus is a joint European project carried out by six companies. The project is partially funded by the European Commission. The project goal is to provide technology to support single-authoring for mobile devices. developerWorks hosts the open source implementation developed by the Consortium. Detailed information about the project is at the Consensus Project home page (http://www.consensus-online.org).
Content Query System (CQS) Project: Summary
Content Query System (CQS). CQS is a distributed peer-to-peer query system for the purpose of discovering content or data. XML messages are passed between systems and query "engines" are used to access the data that is being made available on the system.
Crypto Accelerator Driver
Device Driver Support for the IBM eServer Cryptographic Accelerator.
Crypto Interface Library
Generalized Interface library for the IBM eServer Cryptographic Accelerator Device Driver. Note, this is a low level api for the Specified adapter, it is not intended to be an interface which is written to by applications. Applications should use the openCryptoki PKCS#11 api for interfacing to the token.
Dynamic Probe Class Library (DPCL)
DPCL is an object-based C++ class library that allows tool developers and sophisticated tool users to build parallel and serial tools using a technology called dynamic instrumentation.
Embedded IBM PowerPC 4xx Linux Support
This project contains packages which enable adding support for IBM PowerPC 4xx Embedded Processors to
Re:IBM's analysis to open software (Score:2)
Its a company, not a person.
A company would research, patent, market, create a 12-point-real-time-global-distribution-enterprise
Re:IBM's analysis to open software (Score:2, Insightful)
Re:IBM's analysis to open software (Score:3, Informative)
Rexx is good.
Both Amiga and OS/2? (Score:5, Funny)
Re:Both Amiga and OS/2? (Score:4, Interesting)
Ahh, to see any mention of OS/2 in print these days brings back mostly fond memories. I dabbled a bit in REXX in those days on OS/2 to get various little tasks done, it was a pretty good tool. Perhaps open sourcing it will be of benefit if it makes its way onto Linux or other platforms. Heck, I wonder if it could run on cell phones or pdas? A good scripting language on those could be very useful and cool.
Now if only IBM would open source the fabulous Workplace Shell [wikipedia.org]!
Re:Both Amiga and OS/2? (Score:2)
Only OS/2 box of mine not in storage, is a microchannel 286 on the token ring segment. The Amigas are on the arcnet...
Re:Both Amiga and OS/2? (Score:4, Interesting)
Yes yes yes yes yes yes yes! There is *nothing* in the OSS world that works anywhere nearly as nice as the WPS. Not Rox, not dfm, not any of them.
Re:Both Amiga and OS/2? (Score:2)
But for IBM to opensource WPS, they would need to opensource SOM which the WPS heavily relied upon... Particularly the DSOM aspect which allowed weird/wonderful stuff like true distributed objects... where you can subclass a class which the implementation is on a different machine to the machine where your implementation resides. And it just works! You can eve
Re:Flame ON (Score:2)
Tyrannosaurus Rexx ?. (Score:3, Funny)
Sad that it's still not GPL'd
After all it's only used on Mainframes these days
Re:Tyrannosaurus Rexx ?. (Score:2, Interesting)
Not true! I use REXX on my home machine to update an inventory DB I've got in MySQL, and I used it extensively on my school machine for my work on my thesis (mostly data extraction 'cause the CFD software I was using, WIND, does damn near nothing in post-processing). I've looked at Perl and Python for scripting since I transitioned to Linux 2 years ago, but I still haven't found anything to rival the REXX "parse" instruction...
Re:Tyrannosaurus Rexx ?. (Score:2)
Re:Tyrannosaurus Rexx ?. (Score:2)
Rexx with tcl bindings also exists, though sadly, is not called called T/Rexx, but Rexx/Tk
You can find them both at:
http://regina-rexx.sourceforge.net/ [sourceforge.net]
Does anyone use it? (Score:2, Interesting)
Is there, for instance, any reason I'd want to use it on Linux?
Re:Does anyone use it? (Score:5, Funny)
Yes. You've used Rexx and have a lot of Rexx applications/megascripts written for your OS/2 or Amiga based systems and you want to migrate.
Come on, that wasn't so hard to figure out.
I'm not sure that will work too well (Score:3, Interesting)
Re:I'm not sure that will work too well (Score:2)
Re:I'm not sure that will work too well (Score:2)
Actually I tried a life version of ecomm or whatever it's called these days and it still had that same butt ugly first appearance.. shame..
Er... IBM *did* hire a designer (Susan Kare)! (Score:4, Informative)
Here are some of the Warp icons [kare.com] she created for IBM.
Re:Er... IBM *did* hire a designer (Susan Kare)! (Score:2)
Re:Does anyone use it? (Score:2)
Re:Does anyone use it? (Score:2)
I have never used it on a Unix system before, but I have done lots of work with it under VM/CMS [wikipedia.org] on a 370 mainframe.
It is a somewhat whacky language, or at least using it to do tasks for VM/CMS is a bit whacky, probably because VM/CMS is a bit whacky. Mainly we used it to to add additional functionality to the built in commands, and to make them easier to use (VM/CMS commands make unix commands seem intuitive).
My fondest memory is having to write REXX using the XEDIT [wikipedia.org] editor on a 3178 or 3179 terminal.
Re:Does anyone use it? (Score:3, Informative)
Re:Does anyone use it? (Score:2)
Kind of neat stuff at the time when that wasn't all that common.
Re:Does anyone use it? (Score:4, Informative)
IBM Works wasn't written in REXX. It was written in C (and/or C++), and was originally Footprint Works (before IBM bought out Footprint for their banking software).
Yaz.
Re:Does anyone use it? (Score:2, Funny)
I went to work several years ago for a job mainly involving mangling files in various ways and into various things. REXX was used almost exclusively for this. I enjoyed coding in it, I guess.. right until the moment I disovered Perl, when I dropped that turgid monstrosity like a hot rock.
REXX is sort of like Perl's retarded younger brother.
REXX would need brass knuckles in order to even beat the crap out of QBASIC.
If languages were pets, REXX would be
Re:Does anyone use it? (Score:4, Interesting)
Compared with i.e. perl (to which i moved when started with Linux) is far easier to read, for simple text parsing is far more clear and scripts are easier to maintain. But if you need to get the output of other programs with it perl wins hands down (that was the first thing that jumped into my sight) and once you get the trick with regular expressions, rexx "normal" way of parsing looks very limited.
Re:Does anyone use it? (Score:2)
Every year I have to parse a set of logs created from an IRC chat session and make them into a readable webpage. I adapted a variation of a script I had written years ago on OS/2 to create HTML pages from template files. I've created an article (as in news) processing system with it. We have a script involving publishing webpages that runs every five minutes every da
Re:Does anyone use it? (Score:2, Informative)
Hey, I thought I was the only one who used primarily Rexx and bash!
I'd actually _like_ to learn Perl, but I've yet to run across a text-processing task I couldn't get done in Rexx.
I'll often load a file into the (GPL'd) Hessling Editor ("THE"), which uses Rexx an an extension language. What the editor's native commands (quite powerful in their own right) won't do on their own, a Rexx ma
Re:Does anyone use it? (Score:2)
Re:Does anyone use it? (Score:2)
I'm a much better ReXX pregrammer than a Perl one. I suppose 10-15 years serious ReXX hacking v 2-3 years part time Perl is why. Perl is very flexible, but then most IBM systems programming is done in ReXX so it's very powerful too.
If you want an easier start than ObjectReXX Regina ReXX runs on Windows and Linux, and isn't a bad implementation, I just took a while to get round wanting to use EXECIO everywhere - the main problem with ReXX portability is the different ways I/O is done
Re:Does anyone use it? (Score:2)
Unfortunately, the language is dead on most other platforms, and hasn't really had anything new introduced to it on the MF for years.
Re:Does anyone use it? (Score:3, Interesting)
Rexx is a scripting language. I used it for things that in the Un*x world you would use a shell (ksh, bash, etc) for, or in some cases, what I would
Rexx is bloody useful (Score:5, Informative)
On the Amiga, applications support Rexx in two ways: they can be commanded using Rexx, and upon certain events they can be made to launch specific Rexx scripts. Rexx commands applications in a markedly different way from the normal UNIX way of working: it assumes the application is already running, and sends commands to make it do different things. If I had a mailer, a Rexx-script for it could look somewhat like this (I forgot the syntax, bear with me...)
ADDRESS KMAIL.0
# now commands are going to the first instance of kmail that is running. Now we'll create a mail. Rexx has highly convenient associative variables for this.
mail.address = "johannesg@slashdot.org"
mail.subject = "Rexx is bloody useful"
mail.body = "at least, if all applications support it"
SEND mail
# Now we will store that mail in our mysql database:
ADDRESS MYSQL.0
SQL INSERT INTO sentmail VALUES mail
COMMIT
And done! We have linked together two already-running applications, to make a new, unique solution.
Similarly, my mailer _should_ just run a Rexx script when mail is received. The script should decide what to do with the mail, which could be classifying it, testing it for spam, forwarding it to another account, or for all I care making an immediate hardcopy and faxing it to my holiday address. None of those functions should be built into the mailer; instead, the user can configure the scripts precisely for his own needs.
This has some major benefits:
- Tools can remain lean, concentrating on core functionality. As long as the Rexx-interface is powerful enough, and the right triggers are provided, any user functionality you can imagine can be added by interfacing other applications to it.
- Complex tools for a specific purpose can be cobbled together by throwing a few existing applications together with some scripting glue.
- The GUI becomes as easy to script as the shell is today.
Of course I am not saying Rexx is the only way to do this, and indeed the KDE people are already moving in this direction with DCOP (I think). However, I believe noone in the Linux world has yet realized how amazingly powerful and useful this concept is.
So in the end, this isn't about Rexx at all - it is about how incredibly useful the concept of scripting together sets of applications is. The language really doesn't matter, since the Rexx interface works on the level of exchanging strings between the script and the addressed application (i.e. it might as well be Perl, or Python, or Ruby, or ...). Rexx is only special because it did this so incredibly well on the Amiga that I still miss it on a weekly basis.
Re:Rexx is bloody useful (Score:4, Informative)
Usually they supported running all internal commands, but at least you could trigger all menu items and hotkeys.
A real life example: When "the web" (as in HTTP) first emerged, of course, no program had support for "clicking" URLs to start a web browser, because, well, web browser were unknown when those other programs were written.
To teach my mailer to start up a browser, I assigned an Arexx script to an hotkey, which would query the current mouse location in the mail text. And then try to match an URL scanning back/forward from that pos (you could ask the mail program for the text lines). If it found one, it would open a web browser window and tell it to open that URL.
This way I hadn't a clickable URL, but all I needed to do was point my mouse at the URL and press F8 and voila. I know clickable URLs are nothing special today anymore. But note, the interesting part is not that I got an URL "clickable", but that I could do that with a program that wasn't made for this.
While today's mailers have plug-in support, you'll have a hard time to query the text and do something new, unanticipated with it. And before I get replies of the kind "but with (gnus, or insert favorite mailer here), you could do this and that to archieve the same": You are missing the point. The point being that there was a standard way which was supported by the majority of programs.
Re:Does anyone use it? (Score:2)
Rexx is a _very_ nice language. It's easy to use, very readable and certainly powerful enough. Comes in "classic" and object-oriented versions.
There may be some advantages to Perl, but it's readability and maintainability is generally so bad, it's not worth the hassle. (Okay, so you like Perl. Now try maintaining _somebody else's_ Perl script!)
Python is a close enough replacement for Rexx for most of my purposes.
Rexx isn't just a scripting language. Entire GUI applications have been written in
Re:Does anyone use it? (Score:2)
Power... (Score:5, Interesting)
IR-24 capture card, Art Department, Superbase & ARexx.
THAT was computing power!
-Charles
Re:Power... (Score:2)
My hat's off to you for getting something useful done with it.
Re:Power... (Score:5, Funny)
What is Rexx? (Score:5, Informative)
IBM is a traditional American company, and back in the old days, IBM managers hired people who were smart and were willing to work[1]. There are many instances of data entry clerks becoming full fledged programmers and even project managers. Rexx, which was invented by an IBMer in the 1960s (?), is a perfect match for this kind of employee. Rexx is very easy to learn. It has no pointers or references (ala Perl). At the same time, Rexx has powerful facilities for string manipulation since most Rexx programs are string-oriented applications like processing queries for a database. Every installation of OS/2 comes with Rexx.
Rexx could actually have precluded the need for Perl if IBM had open sourced it 20 years ago.
By the way, the inventor of Rexx became an IBM fellow.
note
----
[1] IBM traditionally refuses to hire anyone without American citizenship. This rule was relaxed to allow the hiring of permanent residents. Nonetheless, as a matter of corporate policy, IBM managers generally do not hire people with an H-1B visa.
Re:What is Rexx? (Score:5, Informative)
perl has references [perldoc.com]
Re:What is Rexx? (Score:2)
Re:What is Rexx? (Score:2)
I'll second that. We have IBM heritage and a woman I work with started as data entry. She's sharp as a tack (and can type on autopilot!) so they put her through some programming courses which she took to like fish to water.
And to keep it on topic- yes, I've used some Rexx! (but I prefer sed and awk these days)
Re:What is Rexx? (Score:2)
Re:What is Rexx? (Score:2)
Where did you ever get that idea from?
IBM has 320,000 employees worldwide, out of which about 150,000 are in the USA.
Most IBM employees aren't even in the USA.
Ah, Rexx (Score:5, Funny)
"REXX is king of the EXEC's"
Thank you thank you. I'll be here all week.
Object Rexx not a mainframe thing (Score:5, Interesting)
Mainframe rexx is more like the (already open source) regina, only without the IO functions, and its been 'functionaly stabilised' (aka no new features) for a while now.
Personally I cant see much use for this Object Rexx, what they need to do is fix the error handling and data passing problems in the non-object Rexx interpreters.
Cool, now open source OS/2 (Score:2, Funny)
Re:Cool, now open source OS/2 (Score:2)
Ah Rexx, that brings back memories (Score:4, Insightful)
Common Public License (Score:3, Interesting)
For me it is also alot easier for me to convince management and legal to use code that are related to IBM ( a reputable commercial company ) or other companies that use the Commmon Public License than code under the GPL. No offense to GPL but a business reality.
I hope that this trend continues.
Re:Common Public License (Score:3, Interesting)
Rexx + KDE + DCOP (Score:3, Insightful)
What (a)rexx did that was so useful (Score:5, Informative)
All the miffed Rexx developers... IBM's history... (Score:5, Interesting)
I recall that IBM had an entire crew of Rexx developers who spent most of their time crying into their coffee-machine cups of mirth about how they had developed a virtual machine, bytecode-based system "a whole decade before Visual Basic and Java."
It was a classic case of "we got their first and didn't do anything with it" that IBM was famous for throughout the 80's and 90's.
The project I was on, for example, had developed a web/CGI-based mail/newsgroup/PIM system that included (I kid you not) a 3D chat system myself and two other developers built as a Netscape 1.0 helper application. Mind you this was before Hotmail/Yahoo! mail/GMail were even on the horizon... They demo'd it a few times and then broke the team up... priceless...
Oh, look... my cup of mirth is getting low...
l8r,
Levendis47
Re:All the miffed Rexx developers... IBM's history (Score:2, Insightful)
Rexx vs Object Rexx (Score:2, Informative)
Dynamic scoping! (Score:2, Interesting)
And _that_ reminds me of one of the weirdest quirks of Rexx: it has DYNAMIC SCOPE!! The variables you have access to from within a procedure depend on where that procedure was c
Re:Dynamic scoping! (Score:2)
Ahh. I wrote a little interpreter a while back (I called it MOOSE) that did that. It was an interesting experiment, but I never put in the time to make it efficient enough for the application I had in mind.
Value of *object* part of object Rexx... (Score:3, Interesting)
OS/2's desktop (workplace shell) was exposed as objects and was very consistant no matter how different parts were viewed. Unfortunately, modern desktops including KDE, Gnome, and Windows XP either don't expose the parts properly or treat 'the desktop' and CLI environments as if they aren't dealing with the same computer.
Without an OS that deals with the system as objects, I don't see the value of Rexx above any of the dozens of others out there.
(I'd like to hear from OS X users if the GUI/CLI split is there or if both are fully integrated.)
Rexx...Meet Lexx (Score:2)
Lexx [primetimesoaps.de]
MUD in REXX (Score:2)
Matt
Ah, the good old days... (Score:2, Informative)
http://www.funet.fi/pub/languages/rexx/rexxfaq.txt [funet.fi]
It seems so... old, I guess. But REXX itself was fun to use, and I spent a lot of time using it and writing applications with (and for) it. It was very approachable, a good way to learn basic programming concepts. It definitely rocked on the Amiga because it was so well-integrated with the system. If O
Dino Family (Score:2)
Great news (Score:2)
Back in the day (Score:2)
Pronunciation. (Score:2)
Can anyone confirm this?
IBM OSS Cred (Score:3, Insightful)
Already replaced by Python??? (Score:2, Interesting)
Re:Already replaced by Python??? (Score:2)
Programming for the Windows API is somewhat similar between REXX (Regina) and Python. Plenty of open source libraries are available for both.
In the past, REXX was a good alternative scripting language to DOS batch. Two features that I still use are exact decimal arithme
Oh no! (Score:2)
My former colleagues paid $1000 for a closed-source Rexx (which they use for doing numerical calculations on a UNIX workstation - go figure) despite the fact that I sent them a copy of Regina Rexx.
Now that IBM Rexx is Open Source they're knackered. Maybe they'll port to Visual BASIC on NT4, which is the current company standard?
You, sir, (Score:5, Insightful)
At my first computer programming job out of college, I was required to write scripts that processed JCL [wikipedia.org] dumps. the scripting language of choice, back then, was CLIST. It was the most horrid "language" I have ever had to program in.
Fortunately, IBM had just released the first version of MVS/TSO [wikipedia.org] that included support for REXX [theamerica...rammer.com]. Unaware that this was a recent thing, I grabbed the offical MVS/Rexx reference book (an internal IBM publication at the time, I believe), and took a week to self teach myself REXX, and ditched CLIST.
When IBM had their Great Layoff of '93, they purged all of the contractors first. As I wrapped up my project to hand over to my IBM supervisors, a look of shock and amazement came over their faces.
IBM'er: "You, you... programmed this in REXX!!!"
Me: "Yeah, so? It was a lot easier to do it that way."
IBM'er: "But, but... nobody here knows REXX!!! What are we going to do?!?!"
I was floored. Because I had a Computer Science degree, I was able to master a simple procedural programming language on my own, with one flimsy, poorly written internal reference document, within a week. The IBM'ers, on the other hand, had no degree, and were totally dependant on internal IBM training and certification in order to understand anything as "advanced" as a new programming language.
That, my friends, is the power of a good University degree.
Re:You, sir, (Score:4, Insightful)
[...]
That, my friends, is the power of a good University degree.
No it isn't. Back in '92 or thereabouts, I was studying away to get the qualifications I would need to get onto a CS course. I learned to program in C, the first 'proper' language I had ever learned. (Until then, it was mostly BASIC, with a little assembly language)
I switched schools a few months later, and was informed that because the tutor at the new school didn't know C, I would need to do my project in Pascal.
So, I learned Pascal. Yes, it took me about a week. Remember this is a long time before I got my degree.
I think what this says is more about the kind of people who get degrees than what you learn on the degree course itself.
Re:You, sir, (Score:2)
Do you think languages have got more complex (JAva, C#, C++), with all the libraries you need to learn with them, or the problems have got harder?
Re:You, sir, (Score:2)
Hmmm...? Not quite sure what you're getting at here. That's clearly a ridiculous assignment, though.
Do you think languages have got more complex (JAva, C#, C++), with all the libraries you need to learn with them, or the problems have got harder?
You don't need to know all of a language's libraries in order to know the language. I, myself, claim to know Java and C+
Re:You, sir, (Score:2)
Re:wow, Rexx: yet another lang=yet another gotcha (Score:2)
Re:wow, Rexx. (Score:2)
It can't have been worse than the work I did a while back with Microsoft QuickBASIC and BTrieve on DOS with a NetWare server...
Re:Well done Mike Colishaw ... (Score:2)
Chip H.