Newsgroups: comp.object
Subject: Re: Is Borland the leader in technology?
From: Des.Kenny@bbs.actrix.gen.nz
Date: Mon, 23 Nov 1992 22:27:31 GMT
Organization: Actrix Information Exchange

In article <henley.921120134945@wilbur.eng.auburn.edu> henley@eng.auburn.edu (James Paul Henley) writes:
> In article <1eecf5INNim8@early-bird.think.com> barmar@think.com (Barry Margolin) writes:
> >In article <1992Nov17.124222.12003@bsu-ucs> 00skolis@leo.bsuvc.bsu.edu writes:
> >>Borland claims to be the leader in Object Oriented Programming. Why do
> >>you feel they can hold this title in concern to the latest in technology?
> >
> >They're probably making this claim based on market share, not necessarily
> >on technical comparison.  This is a common marketing strategy.  I wouldn't
> >be surprised if their Turbo C++ is the largest selling OO language product.
> >Does Turbo Pascal have OO facilities, too?
> >-- 
> >Barry Margolin
> >System Manager, Thinking Machines Corp.
> >
> >barmar@think.com          {uunet,harvard}!think!barmar
> 
> 
> You haven't heard?  They introduced OOP way back in version 5.5, and they
> now have version 7.0 out.  They also have OOP support in Turbo Pascal for
> Windows, and in fact, you really can't program for Windows effectively without
> using OOP.  Since most CS departments look down their noses at PC based
> languages, I'm not surprised how little they know about TP.  I spent an
> hour arguing with one of the professors in the CS department here one day.
> He kept saying: "Yes, but you cant do XXX in Turbo Pascal".  I would then
> explain *exactly* how to do XXX in Turbo Pascal, and he would say "Yes, but
> you can't do YYY in Turbo Pascal." ad nauseum.  He finally ran out of things
> that he thought TP could not do, and was literally speechless.
> 
> So far, every attempt to implement object oriented Chemical Engineering
> applications in Smalltalk and Lisp have fizzled.  Those languages simply
> cannot handle the number crunching necessary.  For me and my purposes,
> Turbo Pascal is the *only* current language that even comes close to handling
> what I need to do.  I have tried Prolog, CLIPS, C++, etc.
> 
> I am having a really hard time getting people in the Computer Science field
> to understand our needs in Chemical Engineering.  Every major OOP development
> in Chemical Engineering has required *too* much computer expertise to use.
> I thought that was what OOP was supposed to avoid!  I'm going to find the
> right OOP tools one way or another, even if it means going to graduate school
> in CS and then developing them myself.
> 
> James P. Henley Jr.
> Chemical Engineering Dept
> Auburn University
> 
  Have you looked at Eiffel . You may find some features in Eiffel to suit
  your requirements. Eiffel has been used for molecular models . I can find
  the reference if you are interested.

  My opinion is that Eiffel is definitely worth a serious look. You may be
  pleasantly surprised. I would be very interested to see what you think of
  it. ISE is about to release a new version ISE Eiffel 3.

  Des Kenny
  Objective Methods Ltd
  Wellington
  New Zealand
  PO Box 17356 Wellington
  phone: 64 4 476 9499
  fax:   64 4 476 9237
  email : Des.Kenny@bbs.actrix.gen.nz