Re: Languages that are hard to parse

Henry Spencer wrote:


(snip regarding COBOL programming)


> For example, on the first
> assignment, the prof told us that we would be graded on how our code
> performed on *his* test data, warned us that it was full of errors and
> inconsistencies, and said that we would be penalized heavily for every
> data problem that our code failed to detect and report. I can think of
> some compiler writers who should have taken that course...


I might have mentioned it before, but this reminds me again of stories
I used to hear about testing compilers with cards from the card
recycling bin. (It seems that cards were higher quality paper so it
was worthwhile to keep them separate.)


Presumably that selects for the kinds of errors that programmers might
make, not to mention the random order of the statements. Also, much
easier than trying to write lines of buggy code to confuse compilers
with. Now that cards are gone, it is hard to find a good substitute.


-- glen

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