Pragmatism Over Purism? An IncrementalApproach To The Teaching Of Object-orientedProgramming.
David Parsons · WIT transactions on information and communication technologies · 1970
The aim of this paper is to explore two contrasting approaches to the teaching of object-oriented programming, the 'purist' and the 'pragmatic', and to describe in detail how a pragmatic approach may be formalised and implemented. 1 To be pure or not to be pure? There are two schools of thought in the arena of object-oriented languages. One is that to be object-oriented, a language must be 'pure'; Perhaps the most vocal exponent of this view is Bertrand Meyer (inventor of the Eiffel language). The alternative approach is one of pragmatism; That objectorientation is a tool like any other and that the purity of this tool is not the issue its usefulness is the sole criteria by which it should be judged. The key advocate of this approach is the inventor of C + +, Bjarne Stroustrup. The two languages of these protagonists (Eiffel and C + +) reflect this differing ideology. Eiffel is a true object-oriented language, while C++ is a hybrid of C with various orthogonal extensions to allow object-oriented programming. Meyer is quoted as saying that 'compatibility with existing software is not an excuse for polluting the language. The language can be C.. .or it can be objectoriented, which is completely different' [1]. In contrast, Stroustrup has said 'It is not right to be pure. It is right to serve your own and other's needs... any way I have a problem with the word 'pure', because it makes me think of stormtroopers' [2]. Transactions on Information and Communications Technologies vol 7, © 1994 WIT Press, www.witpress.com, ISSN 1743-3517