Re: Garbage Collection - Stop Making Trash

From: Tommy McDaniel (tdmj_at_hotmail.com)
Date: 07/21/04 

Date: 20 Jul 2004 21:01:55 -0700

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Man, I've been trying to reply to stuff for days, and after seeing
nothing pop up in a long time I finally looked to see if Google Groups
sends messages posted to both moderated and unmoderated groups only to
the moderated one, and indeed that is what it does. That would have
been a real fricking handy thing to tell people who are doing so
before they sit around for days wondering why the heck their posts
aren't even showing up on unmoderated groups. Since I'm invariably
silenced by the comp.lang.c++.moderated censors (seems to be the
popular thing to do these days if you don't tow the party line
regarding garbage collection), I'll have to start posting the exact
same thing to both groups separately. What a great piece of brilliance
this system is.

Hyman Rosen <hyrosen@mail.com> wrote in message news:<9w4Lc.24933$F8.7083@nwrdny02.gnilink.net>...
> Keith H Duggar wrote:
> > Or the question is as is and he simply wanted examples of
> > cases that require garbage collection.
>
> OK. Assuming you're right, he might want to investigate why GCC
> went to garbage collection after decades of using C-style memory
> allocation techniques.

That's not an example of a problem that requires garbage collection.
He could ask the Java monkeys until he turns blue in the face why they
personally prefer garbage collection, but that is still not an example
of a problem that requires garbage collection. You are the one
advocating garbage collection ueber alles here; you provide the
examples. He asked here, not the GCC people.

> He also says in the same post that "I have very much trouble
> figuring out why anyone would want to perturb a language like
> C++ with things like gcnew" which I count as being on the
> "change is bad" side of the ledger.

Count it as whatever you want to. The rest of us will count it as
being on the "things like gcnew are bad" side of the ledger; actually,
that can be refined to being on the "things like gcnew are bad for
C++" side of the ledger.

> > argument : It is desirable, because it is desired.
> > flaw : tautology
> > red herring
> > circular argument
> > begging the question
> > argumentum ad populum (appeal to public)
>
> That is, it is desirable to have a programming language
> which supports GC

Bzzt, wrong answer. There is not "a" programming language which
supports garbage collection, there are a buttload of programming
languages which support garbage collection, including C++ with
appropriate libraries.

> becuase there are many programmers who
> desire it.

There are also many programmers who do not desire it. Many programmers
don't like anything that hurts their heads more than Visual Basic and
probably want MFC inserted into C++, but now I am just repeating stuff
I already told you. Reread and try again.

> No logical flaw in that, and no logical flaw
> in a company giving its programmers and customers what
> they want. Rather, good business sense.

Already discussed. Reread and try again.

> > argument : Many programmers feel profound relief at not
> > having to deal with endless varieties of smart
> > pointers and worrying about object lifetimes.
> > flaw : red herring
> > argumentum ad populum
> > argumentum ad numerum (appeal to numbers)
>
> You keep implying that appealing to the public and to
> numbers in programming language design is a logical flaw.
> No one has made you, or anyone else, lord and master of
> what language programmers may use.

Meaning that they don't have to use bad old C++, they can use any of
the garbage collected languages out there. Or even garbage collection
libraries for C++.

> > argument : No one is forcing you to use it if you choose
> > not to
> > flaw : red herring
> > straw man
>
> This addresses those people who do not want GC to be part of
> C++. They cannot prevent others from adding it, but they are
> free not to use itthemselves.

Thank you for pointing that out, no one had seen you mention it over
and over and over and .... This was already discussed. Reread and try
again.

> > argument : It is a problem that Microsoft has chosen to solve
> > by extending the existing language.
> > flaw : red herring
> > complex question
> > argumentum ad verecundiam (appeal to authority)
>
> The authorities in this case are people who are extremely
> respected in the design and theory of C++. There is not much
> in the way of argument against them that their design is
> flawed or unworkable, merely that some find it, and GC in
> general, unappealing.

And weren't you the same guy who was all about appealing to people
about three paragraphs up?

> > argument : Microsoft is providing what their customers and
> > their own developers want.
> > flaw : begging the question
> > dicto simpliciter (generalization)
> >
> > and throughout your post argumentum ad nauseam (repetition).
>
> Yes. And to repeat again, many programmers want GC, because it
> relieves them of a burdensome and unnecessary responsibility.

Already discussed. Reread and try again.

> GC is not a new concept, and is present in many other languages.

That's nice. So?

> As a programming language, C++ confers many advantages not present
> in other languages.

Yes, why not take this unique blend of studliness and turn it into C#
or Java.

> Therefore, combining C++ and GC might result
> in a language with the adevantages of both.

Or more likely, the disadvantages of both. C++ has already proven
itself for decades (roughly).

> It is choosing to standardize this design so that
> its semantics will be public and unambiguous.

You forgot the part about "so that it can later ignore the standard
and introduce incompatibility, as is its way."

> It is a separate
> standard from its host language

That does not mean that it will remain so. And as I have said, that is
the main issue in all of this.

> Microsoft has done the work
> itself; it has not demanded that others pay for its efforts (except
> for those who will become customers of its implementation).

You must think they grow their money on money trees. Just because they
did not pass around a 'CLI standardization invoice' does not mean that
people have not paid for it (those unfortunate enough to use their
stuff).

In any case, I think it is safe to say that you fully believe in the
logical legitimacy of argumentum ad nauseam (for those whining about
big words, "the false conception that a statement is likely to be true
if it has been repeated over and over many times, possibly by
different people," http://www.fact-index.com/a/ar/argumentum_ad_nauseam.html).

Tommy McDaniel
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