Subject: langage

From: Didier MATHIEU <[email-masked]>
Date: Thu, 23 Oct 1997 09:20:00 +0200

Hello,

I am a new subscriber to CCL. I read recently a discussion about OO
programming in computational chemistry, dealing mostly with Fortran, C
and C++ langages. 

For me I have to choose a programming langage. Indeed, facing a serious
need for a broad range of specific programs for molecular engineering of
energetic materials (implementing simple and efficient empirical models
based on molecular mechanics, groups increments, QSPR relationships...) 
we have these programs written by students who remain in the team for
short training periods (few months). 
In this context of fairly long-term projects with high turnover and poor
communication between succesive programmers, pieces of code written by
some people must be used easily by others, hence codes must be at least
modular. Experience with Fortran has shown us that training students,
because of the limited time allocated, are in a hurry to implement as
much as possible, and resulting code is not well structured. On the
other hand, since they are mostly students in physics or chemistry, most
of them do not master C or C++ , although all of them have some
programming experience, for instance with Pascal or Basic.

According to me, none of those free langages, C, C++ and Fortran, is a
good choice and I am looking for a SIMPLE langage supporting REUSABILITY
and QUICK DEVELOPMENT. 

Maybe some at CCL have some interesting suggestions or experience ?

-- 
Didier MATHIEU
CEA - Le Ripault, BP 16
37260 Monts (France)
Tel. 33(0)2.47.34.41.85