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Did not have exposure to that. Interesting. Not sure how often it would be useful, but if it helps....
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The CHILL language, providing this, was essentially developed to program network switches. If you have been much in contact with communication guys, you have certainly noted that they love designing protocols as state machines:
Any entity is at any time in one of a limited number of states. Whatever happens in the interface is modeled as an atomic event; the event ID being one of a limited set of values. The processing of the event depends on the current state and the event ID. Processing is (conceptually) atomic, and changes the entity state into a new value. So a very common usage would be like (in quasi-C syntax, Chill was somewhat different)
switch (state, eventID) {
(disconnected, setupReq): ... code to handle a call setup request...
(transferMode, dataPacket): ...
... more state/event combinations, with their specific handling ...
(transferMode, ELSE): ... error hadling, protocol error, not allowed in transferMode state...
ELSE: ... general error handling for illegal event in current state, not treated as a specific case...
Now, some protocols are so complex that a "pure" state machine would end up with thousands of states. So the protocol spec defines from one up to a small handful of state variables, which may be thought of as sub-states in most cases (not always, but "sort of like"). So you could add one or more of those state variables as the third switch field, if they should lead to distinctly different handling. (For many switch cases, the switch label would be "Don't care" for that state/eventID combination.)
So, for protocols defined as state machines, the multidimensional switch statement is a perfect match.
I love that kind of protocol specification! It is terse, lucid, unambiguous, and most of all: It pinpoints all protocol error situations and makes it very clear to you where you should define an error handler, and the reasons for raising this error condition.
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Anders Hejlsberg came from Borland/Delphi/Pascal to Microsoft to develop C#. The idea was to sunk Delphi, the only real competitor in the RAD arena.
Well, they almost did.
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This is the truth. C# has a lot of Java influence. Sure it borrows from bits and pieces in places from everywhere, but its main influence is from Java. It was created by Java people. This is the truth. If the book says otherwise it's just wrong.
C Sharp (programming language) - Wikipedia[^]
Now, where VB comes into play a lot... the VB IDE. When .NET first came out Dev Studio for C++ and Dev Studio VB were two different apps. Entirely different. What Microsoft did at first was take the IDE for VB and use it as the basis for the .NET IDE and tossed the old C++ one out the door. So, it had a VBish feel and inspection on it with tools like Spy++ had VB all over the place with class names, etc.
This is not to say C# didn't have "some" VB influences, I'm sure it did. But the truth is, most of it's influence is from Java. And the largest VB knock off I've seen with it was with the IDE itself.
My source? About a quarter century of programming stuff.
Oh, and if this was a joke, then I completely missed it. 
Jeremy Falcon
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Jeremy Falcon wrote: C# has a lot of Java influence.
Never implied otherwise. But you don't seem to be the only one taking it that way. If you look closely at what the book says, it reads "many of C#’s syntactic constructs" come from VB influence. Not that the entire language does.
Jeremy Falcon wrote: if this was a joke,
No, but I think some of you are hastily reading the message. 
There are two kinds of people in the world: those who can extrapolate from incomplete data.
There are only 10 types of people in the world, those who understand binary and those who don't.
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RyanDev wrote: No, but I think some of you are hastily reading the message.
It's how we roll up in this joint.
Jeremy Falcon
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Indeed. 
There are two kinds of people in the world: those who can extrapolate from incomplete data.
There are only 10 types of people in the world, those who understand binary and those who don't.
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many of C#’s syntactic constructs are modeled after various aspects of Visual Basic (VB) and C++.
"Modeled after" sometimes means "things that were intentionally avoided".
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Could be. 
There are two kinds of people in the world: those who can extrapolate from incomplete data.
There are only 10 types of people in the world, those who understand binary and those who don't.
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RyanDev wrote: and found this gem in the beginning.
That sounds like Veritable Bull**** 
Marc
Latest Article - Create a Dockerized Python Fiddle Web App
Learning to code with python is like learning to swim with those little arm floaties. It gives you undeserved confidence and will eventually drown you. - DangerBunny
Artificial intelligence is the only remedy for natural stupidity. - CDP1802
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Oh, such a Voracious Bite you have there mister. I like it.
Jeremy Falcon
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I rescued a VB 6.0 book from the garbage to enlight myself in the depth of this "zombie language" 
Press F1 for help or google it.
Greetings from Germany
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VB Love is easily cured.
In fact, it usually passes shortly after puberty. 
Arguing with a woman is like reading the Software License Agreement. In the end, you ignore everything and click "I agree".
Anonymous
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If only. Unfortunately, for some people, it's a life-long affliction.
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Ok.
Lemme gat back to you in two six 62.5 hours.
Right.
(Click)
[chirp chirp chirp chirp ...]
[edit]
(Sorry, miscalculation)
(bigger miscalculation (calculator in HEX mode))
[end edit]
modified 2-Aug-17 18:49pm.
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I worked with the first few versions of Delphi (Object Pascal) in the 90ties.
And when I saw .Net (VB and C#), I had to conclude that they copied Delphi, only replaced the Pascal Language with a VB dialect and a C-ish/Java-ish language.
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I always considered C#'s syntax moving backward in programming language design. Really, the only reason it exists is to appeal to legacy C and C++ programmers and programmers of any other language built on that ancient syntax like Java. People too lazy to learn a better, more modern syntax designed for more modern IDEs and compilers.
Visual Basic is far more elegant and intuitive in it's syntax. Simple things like using "End While" or "End Function" rather than generic "}" lets you quickly see what functional block is what. LINQ is another example of being far more elegant in VB. I don't doubt that quote in the slightest.
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Bryan Schuler wrote: Simple things like using "End While" or "End Function" rather than generic "}" l
Amen!
There are two kinds of people in the world: those who can extrapolate from incomplete data.
There are only 10 types of people in the world, those who understand binary and those who don't.
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RyanDev wrote: The truth of the matter is that many of C#’s syntactic constructs are modeled after various aspects of Visual Basic (VB) and C++.
That's a good thing. It helps a developer make the transition between the two paradigms. The fact that C# and VB.Net are so similar in many ways really makes life easier.
If you think hiring a professional is expensive, wait until you hire an amateur! - Red Adair
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Doesn't C#'s foreach come from VB's For Each? AFAIK C++ doesn't have any equivalent.
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We still miss some loop constructs that are offered by other languages. One that I miss the most is
for ListElementPointer in ListHead:NextField ....
to traverse a singly linked list, linked through NextField. Then I miss the value set:
for CodeValue in 1, 3, 10..20, 32 do ...
(a total of 14 iterations). And then, another favorite:
for ever do ...
In C, I sometimes "simulate" this by #define ever (;;). Finally, I miss the alternative loop exits, where you specify a different loop tail depending on whether the value set was exhausted or the loop was terminated prematurely because some condition was fulfilled:
for ... do
... code ...
while <contidion for="" looping="" further="">
... maybe more code ...
exitwhile
...code handling premature loop termination...
exitfor
...code handling value set exhausted termination...
An important aspect of the exitfor/exitwhile is that the code is inside the scope or the for statement, so that e.g. variables decalared within the for is available to the tail processing.
If you want to simulate this by setting some termination flag and then break, and after the loop testing: if TerminationCause=exhaustion do <this> else <that>, then what went on in the loop is essentially lost, so this is certainly not a good replacement (and it takes a lot more typing).
Finally, for all sorts of nested constructs: I strongly favor that a label identifies a block, rather than a point. I want to be able to do an: exit InnerLoop; or: exit OuterLoop; or even: exit MyProcedure; without the need for setting all sorts of flags that must be tested after InnerLoop and after OuterLoop and from there take new exit to an outer level.
You could say that this is little more than syntactic sugar. Sure, but syntactic sugar makes programming sweet.
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Your experience here on CodeProject with QA Forums may put you on the inside track, Jack (or, Jill) [^].Quote: “Planetary protection is concerned with the avoidance of organic-constituent and biological contamination in human and robotic space exploration.”
Nasa maintains policies for planetary protection, applicable to all space flight missions that may intentionally or unintentionally carry Earth organisms and organic constituents to the planets or other solar system bodies, and any mission employing spacecraft, which are intended to return to Earth and its biosphere with samples from extraterrestrial targets of exploration.”
«Differences between Big-Endians, who broke eggs at the larger end, and Little-Endians gave rise to six rebellions: one Emperor lost his life, another his crown. The Lilliputian religion says an egg should be broken on the convenient end, which is now interpreted by the Lilliputians as the smaller end. Big-Endians gained favor in Blefuscu.» J. Swift, 'Gulliver's Travels,' 1726CE
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We need a more exciting name. How abou BioCop?
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Space Sanitation Engineer
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