Should I convert FORTRAN code to C?

[Owen DeLong]

In article <2742 at utastro.UUCP> rlr at utastro.UUCP (Randy Ricklefs) writes:
>We will soon start porting software from a number of different sources to a
>micro-processor-based UNIX system.  Most of the code is in various dialects
>of FORTRAN.  The question that arises is whether to convert all this stuff
>to a more modern language, particularly c.  This suggests several questions
>which I hope the NET readers will help answer (without starting a 100-years
>war on languages ... please! :-) ):

Ahh, Why not?  Language wars are so much fun.... You get to tie up so many
peoples telebits with such garbage, and everyone can flame you... :-)

>1) Are people actually initiating new projects in FORTRAN, or are they
>	maintaining and porting old FORTRAN code?

Some, but that's just because they haven't ported their programmers to c yet.

>2) Does the answer to 1) change if we restrict discussion to PC's & Macs?

Yes, more Mac and PC programmers have been ported to c than in the system 3
environment.  (What, you mean someone besides IBM makes computers? :-)

>3) Is c a suitable replacement for FORTRAN in terms of mathematical capabil-
>	ities and portablility?

Absolutely not, for this, you need COBOL! :-)... Seriously, I wouldn't wish
COBOL on my worst enemy.

>4) Are there reliable FORTRAN to c translators available under MS-DOS or UNIX
>	that will allow moving over to c without re-coding the world?

I haven't seen anything.  There was a review of FORTRAN to LISP converters in
Computer Language once, I think, and the author there basically said he hadn't
seen any inter-language translator he found to be reliable.

>
>Thanks in advance for the help!
>
>Randy
>

I hope some of this is helpful, but I couldn't resist the opportunity to poke
fun at a language that should have died before assembly was born.

Owen

Disclaimer:  WRS won't give me execute access to cc yet.