C and Pascal Are Basically the Same Language

This comparison has been made quite frequently over the years, yet nothing is further from the truth. From the compiler's perspective, the Pascal architecture is much more straightforward. It adheres to stronger type definitions, making optimizations easier to accomplish. From the programmer's perspective, the nature of Pascal is inherently different from C in convention, syntax, structure and mindset.

I have converted several C source code projects, and even a few C++ projects, to Pascal and Object Pascal, and I've seen a variety of coding styles. The process of converting a C program to a Pascal program provides first hand experience in the differences between the two languages. In Pascal, declarations must be moved to the top of a block, and often a lot of investigation is required to decipher many of the C data structures. During the conversion process, I reorganize the code, changing and indenting it to make it more readable, so that the actual translation process is much easier. It's a significant amount of work, however, and in some cases the difficulty was so extreme that I canceled the task.

The point is that while C code can be made readable, it provides loopholes that give programmers the ability to create chaos. Given the weak typing of the C language, inconsistency of data use becomes not only a possibility, but a probability. Pascal's strong typing makes inconsistency of data use far less likely to occur.

Another difference between C and Pascal is the underlying design of the language, and the intent of that design. C shares APL's penchant for being able to cram a lot of action into a single expression or line-of-code. This provides a certain "cool" factor that many programmers appreciate, but it also leads to a bloated and unreadable code base which can be difficult, at best, to maintain. The extensive operator overloading and weak-typing architecture increases the odds that a programmer will get caught up in the "passion" of the moment, indulge every shortcut, and end up with a maintenance nightmare.

Cultures have sprung up around both languages; cultures reflecting different attitudes toward getting work done. The culture of Pascal is oriented unapologetically toward readability in style, elegance of algorithm, and its expression as code. The culture of C is self-consciously ambitious, yet obfuscatory. This is illustrated quite well by C. A. R. Hoare in an introduction to the classic paper, An Axiomatic Definition of the Programming Language Pascal, for the book, Great Papers in Computer Science. In reference to his goal of designing a better programming language - one which makes it easier to write correct programs and harder to write incorrect ones - Hoare writes, "It is a matter of continuing regret that so few languages have ever been designed to meet that goal, or even to make significant concessions towards it. For example, the programming language C was designed to assist in writing a small single-user operating system (UNIX) for a real-time minicomputer (PDP 11), now thankfully obsolete. For this purpose, its low level of abstraction and plethora of machine-oriented features are entirely appropriate. For all other purposes, they are a nuisance. The successful propagation of the language can be explained by accidental, commercial, historical, and political factors; it is hardly due to any inherent quality as a tool for the reliable creation of sophisticated programs.

source : http://pascal-central.com/ppl/chapter4.html#Myth1

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