Subject:
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Re: FW: Something else is needed, I think...
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Newsgroups:
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lugnet.robotics
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Date:
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Wed, 5 May 1999 03:35:47 GMT
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Original-From:
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stephen p spackman <stephen@#stopspammers#acm.org>
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Viewed:
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929 times
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Kekoa Proudfoot wrote:
> But I back down from this now, for two reasons. First, you do not need
> floating point to implement sin(); it works just fine with fixed point.
> Second, (having thought about this a bit) floating point is not that bad as
> long as you don't use the routines that come with GCC and you implement
> only a subset of IEEE. Having thought about this, I think you can do much,
> much better than 6K if you drop certain parts of IEEE.
But what does it benefit us? *This* is creeping featurism at its worst:
FORTRAN has it, so we should too.... In my entire professional life I've
never had an application for floating point.
And then we all switch sides for some of the features that support
structure and engineering:
> > These are all not necessary. Remember, these features exist to allow
> > LARGE programs to be written easily. The RCX is not going to run large
> > programs, no matter what you do. It'd be better to implement only
> > global variables and concentrate on a fast interpreter.
>
> This is a possibility I had not really considered, but certainly since
> "simple enough to get the job done" is a wonderful design philosophy in my
> opinion, this could be a simplifying step in the right direction. I'll
> think about it more.
Ok, but I *fire* people who code like that. Do we want our children to
learn with global variables? If all we care about is getting the job
done, why are we messing around with lego? I must be missing something
here.
So why not a *simple* language, one that lacks arbitrary restrictions
about what can nest in what else, and leaves out the inexplicable cruft
like floating point (have you ever tried to write a semantics for
floating point - or a spec for a programme using it?)?
stephen
--
Did you check the web site first?: http://www.crynwr.com/lego-robotics
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Message has 2 Replies:
 | | Re: FW: Something else is needed, I think...
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| (...) Floating point is easier to use than fixed point for many. Not that I need floating point, I can figure out the math and use fixed point. Moreover, I can use GCC and Librcx/LegOS and program at the lowest-level too! My point is that some (...) (25 years ago, 5-May-99, to lugnet.robotics)
| | | Re: FW: Something else is needed, I think...
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| At 05:50 05-05-1999 Wednesday , you wrote: [...] (...) Here's my idea: IMHO we don't need full floating point, we need fixed point with 3 (4?) decimal places tops! I also think we don't need to use the IEEE standard because there is no advantage in (...) (25 years ago, 5-May-99, to lugnet.robotics)
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Message is in Reply To:
| | Re: FW: Something else is needed, I think...
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| (...) Part of my point, which I did not state clearly, was that any reasonable sin() required floating-point, and that this made sin() not worth it. But I back down from this now, for two reasons. First, you do not need floating point to implement (...) (25 years ago, 5-May-99, to lugnet.robotics)
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