[RsR] estimators based on random samples... - should be random

[Martin Maechler]

>>>>> "ValenT" == Valentin Todorov <valentin.todorov using chello.at>
>>>>>     on Wed, 10 May 2006 09:46:58 +0200 writes:

    >> C++ complicates things slightly
    ValenT> you mean under R, not in general?

yes. It slightly complicates things for interfacing to any S dialect,
including R and S-plus.

    >> and typically is a tad (10% ?) slower than C.

    ValenT> and assembler is even faster!

:-)

    >> R's C API is a C and not C++ API anyway.


    >> I think it's only worth using C++ for some kind of problems
    >> (e.g. when a class structure can make the program much more readable),

    ValenT> and this is almost always the case - a class structure makes a program 
    ValenT> always more readable

I'm not going to debate further here;   of course what
"readable" means exactly depends very much on the reader, 
and in particular on what kind of reading one is used to...


    >> and I doubt that the covMcd() or ltsReg() algorithms belong to
    >> this class.

    ValenT> not until they are translated 1-1 from Fortran. I doubt also that covMcd/Lts 
    ValenT> are readable at all now and I expect the readability to decrease (with much 
    ValenT> more than 10%) when converted authomatically to C.

I agree that readability would decrease slightly *) --
but if it's "not readable at all now", i.e., 0% readable,
it cannot get much lower by a decrease  :-) :-)

Martin

*) for that reason I had developed my perl script to
 post-process the result; and I usually also invest a few hours
 of manual postprocessing such that in the end, I believe that
 readability would be about the same.