On Wed, 17 Jul 2019 12:22:35 -0400, Steve Smith wrote: >The original sin was making "=" the assignment operator. I guess we can >blame that on FORTRAN, and it must make mathematicians cringe still. > I once (ca. 1967) needed to enlighten and disillusion a naive but persistent physics graduate student who had coded in what he believed was FORTRAN something akin to:
B( 1 ) = X( 1 ) * 1 + X( 2 ) * 2 B( 2 ) = X( 1 ) * 3 + X( 2 ) * 4 B( 1 ) = 3.14 B( 2 ) = 2.718 PRINT X( 1 ) X( 2 ) ... expecting to solve a system of linear equations, apparently assuming that "=" was not assignment but a sort of identity declaration. I.e. determine the values of X() that satisfy all the "equations". I can barely imagine the number of false starts he needed to circumvent syntax errors before he approached me for counsel. -- gil ---------------------------------------------------------------------- For IBM-MAIN subscribe / signoff / archive access instructions, send email to lists...@listserv.ua.edu with the message: INFO IBM-MAIN
