in reply to Re: Unsure why this isn't working?
in thread Unsure why this isn't working?

Which is an oblique answer: the file is not in plain format and raw code (generally) must be.

When I wrote control software for nuclear reactors, we had to write each program twice. Once in assembler, once using a combination of variable definition tables, prose and Pascal-ish code in Word. The idea was to use as different a mental model as possible.

The Word doc would serve as the final spec and documentation, but it would also be parsed and compiled so that we could run our test suite against it (in order to compare the results it gave with those from the assembler program).

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Re^3: Unsure why this isn't working?
by Your Mother (Archbishop) on Aug 05, 2010 at 01:08 UTC

    That's a *great* story and a really interesting/cool approach. Also, I'm glad it was you writing nuclear reactor software and not me. Better for everyone, I think.

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Re^3: Unsure why this isn't working?
by aquarium (Curate) on Aug 05, 2010 at 01:57 UTC
    Is that why there was that "low level" radioactive material leak in a Canadian reactor? ;)
    Seriously..don't you end up with two essentially different programs that test and execute differently?
    Java has a disclaimer not to be used for controlling reactors or missiles..funny stuff
    the hardest line to type correctly is: stty erase ^H
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      don't you end up with two essentially different programs that test and execute differently?

      You end up with two programs that are functionally equivalent. If their output diverge, there's a bug in at least one of them. Or in the program that compiles the Word document, as it happened a couple of times.

      Is that why there was that "low level" radioactive material leak in a Canadian reactor? ;)

      This? It sounds so minor! It would probably be worth it for the excitement of getting something other than zero on the periodic urine tests used to detect alpha and beta doses. Badges detect gamma.

[reply]
        I am sorry for OT, but that information changed my feeling of nuclear reactors:

        Coal typically contains small part of uranium. Though smoke of coal power plants is filtered, they produce much more radioactivity than nuclear ones, spreading it directly to the atmosphere.

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