Re: Newbie question -- dereferencing access

[Ludovic Brenta <ludovic@ludovic-brenta.org>]

On Mar 12, 10:57 am, Tim Rowe <spamt...@tgrowe.plus.net> wrote:
> Ludovic Brenta wrote:
> > On Mar 11, 9:26 pm, Tim Rowe <spamt...@tgrowe.plus.net> wrote:
> >> If I have an access variable, for example:
> >>      s: access string := new String'("Foo");
> >> is there an easy way to assign from s to a string variable? Obviously I
> >> can't assign it directly, because access string is not string, so how do
> >> I convert? Everything I read says that dereferences happen
> >> automatically, but in this situation!
>
> >    Copy_Of_S : String := s.all;
>
> > This also works when passing parameters, e.g.
>
> >    procedure P (Str : in String) is null;
> > begin
> >    P (s.all);
>
> Perfect! Thanks.
>
> Can you (or anyone else) suggest a good book or online tutorial for an
> existing programmer, wanting to add Ada to his language portfolio? I
> have John Barnes "Programming in Ada 95", but I don't find his
> explanations very clear (and I couldn't find the answer to the question
> above), so if there's something better out there it might be worth me
> getting it.

The Ada Programing wikibook has received a lot of praise and has a
complete chapter discussing access types:

http://en.wikibooks.org/wiki/Ada_Programming/Types/access

See also the books and tutorials listed at http://www.adaic.com/learn/index.html

--
Ludovic Brenta.