trigraphs in X3J11

[Ed Nather]

In article <8805271311.AA12359 at decwrl.dec.com>, minow at thundr.dec.com (Martin Minow THUNDR::MINOW ML3-5/U26 223-9922) writes:

[much clearly stated wisdom omitted]
> 
> Because of the speed of conversion to ISO-8859 (and similar 8-bit
> environments), coupled with ambiguities in the definition of trigraphs,
> I recommended in my comments to the standard that they be dropped.
> The committee rejected my arguments, but I would hope they reconsider
> before release of the standard.
> 

So would I.  The many, many negative comments about trigraphs on the net,
some from Europeans who would be expected to "benefit" from this new,
ugly and totally untested idea, say it is not just bad, but very bad.

Why mess up a fine job (according to dmr) of standardizing by quietly
introducing something that is so ugly it will never be used?

Of course, compilers which comply with the new standard might be
advertized as "Not Including Trigraphs" to gain sales, in the same
way the ads say "Not Copy Protected."


-- 
Ed Nather
Astronomy Dept, U of Texas @ Austin
{allegra,ihnp4}!{noao,ut-sally}!utastro!nather
nather at astro.AS.UTEXAS.EDU