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Thomas E. Kurtz has died

(computerhistory.org)
613 points 1986 | 1 comments | 14 Nov 24 22:12 UTC | HN request time: 0.211s | source
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WalterBright ◴[15 Nov 24 20:46 UTC] No.42150808[source]▶
I originally learned to program with BASIC. When I was designing D, I thought back to how easy and natural string manipulation was in BASIC, and what a festering swamp of bugs it was in C.

Having strings as easy and correct in D was a major priority, and history has shown that this was a success.

P.S. Whenever I review C code, I first look at the string manipulation. The probability of finding a bug in it is near certainty. Question for the people who disagree - without looking it up, how does strncpy() deal with 0 termination?

Thank you, Thomas Kurtz!

replies(6): >>42150847 #>>42150921 #>>42151230 #>>42153040 #>>42155368 #>>42203247 #
1. 8bitsrule ◴[16 Nov 24 08:59 UTC] No.42155368[source]▶
BASIC was the language in all the magazines that responded to people who wanted to try ideas in their new microcomputers. Tens of thousands of us, at least (some so glad they took those high-school typing courses) simultaneously keying in those pages. And then, we'd think 'hey, I want to try this' and either succeeding or looking for more powerful BASICs ... leading to peeks, pokes, even assembler. A blast, and that feeling of empowerment!

Thank you, Thomas Kurtz!