Subj : Extending Pl/I
To : David Noon
From : Murray Lesser
Date : Sun Feb 18 2001 11:20 am
(David Noon wrote to Mike Luther on 02-17-01, topic: "Language For
Multi-platfo")
Hi David--
(In the following, "ML>" identifies a quote from Mike Luther.)
DN>Replying to a message of Mike Luther to Murray Lesser:
DN>More interestingly, REXX is an extensible language. This means you
>can write extension DLL's in whatever native code language you
>fancy, provided it supports _System linkage convention. There are
>plenty of samples in C, and I have posted samples in PL/I
>and assembler. Thus, when the base language runs out of
>capability or too slowly, branch off into some native
>object code to do the fiddly bits.
PL/I is also extensible :-). (Almost any compiled language and
many interpreted languages are extensible with assembled procedures. I
wrote three books in the 1980s dealing with extending various dialects
of MS BASIC compilers). There used to be less necessity for extending
PL/I than for extending REXX, and it is much more difficult. Extending
PL/I may have become more likely for those of us who write text-mode
utilities, now that IBM has dropped the PL/I capability to make direct
calls to the 16-bit OS/2 APIs.
DN>None of the major development tools vendors is supporting
>16-bit code any more, except in their assemblers. All
>modern compilers produce 32-bit code exclusively. The
>upshot is that DOS is dead. Indeed, there is no ISO/ANSI-
>certified C++ compiler for 16-bit DOS, AFAIK. [Jonathan
>might know of one.] All the 16-bit C compilers are C89 or
>worse [K&R], with no C99 compilers available. As I said,
>DOS is dead.
Hmmm. Is that new fashion the reason IBM dropped the ability to
compile PL/I procedures calling the 16-bit bsesub.cpy OS/2 API
functions, in FP-6? Another loss to fashion? I keep a copy of
the FP-4 version of my compiler in a different partition, just to avoid
having to "extend" PL/I with assembled procedures. Once compiled, the
calls run fine under the runtime DLLs that came with FP-6.
ML> PL/1(i), whatever, OS/2, Win-ugh, DOS .. and REXX, are they really
ML> suitable tools for poor Mikey?
DN>It's PL/I.
DN>Only you can answer the question. How you collect
>background information to formulate the answer is up to
>you. But you have been given information from the two
>members of this echo who have the most experience with
>PL/I, and we both know/knew C too. I also know C++ quite
>thoroughly. And I dabble in REXX a bit, too. ... :-)
Thanks for the kind words. However, Mike should note that I am one
of the _only_ two members of this echo who admit to having an
acquaintance with PL/I. If he really needs technical advice, he should
do what I do: ask you :-).
Regards,
--Murray
<Team PL/I>
___
* MR/2 2.30 #120 * Never send a PM program to do a text-mode job
--- Maximus/2 3.01
* Origin: COMM Port OS/2 juge.com 204.89.247.1 (281) 980-9671 (1:106/2000)
