Meinrad Recheis wrote:
> also as history shows, the existence of the c++ standard did not make
> the major c++ compilers fully compatible to each other ;)
>   

And also the absence of standard in BASIC made dozens of dialects. FULL 
BASIC was standardized in 1987...which was too late.
Having a standard will not always force implementers to stick on it but 
languages without standards are nothing but chaos.  You want Microsoft 
VisualRuby++ or something like that?

# I'm not attacking Microsoft.