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Date: 14 Jan 92 20:49:28 GMT
From: att!cbnews!cbnewsl!willett@ucbvax.Berkeley.EDU  (david.c.willett)
Subject: Re: Ada statement
Message-ID: <1992Jan14.204928.21571@cbnewsl.cb.att.com>
List-Id: <comp.lang.ada>

>>From article <1992Jan14.031331.18320@cs.rose-hulman.edu>, by eigenstr@zoe.cs.r
ose-hulman.edu (Todd R. Eigenschink):
> about this then.  And now...the $64,000 question....
> 
> 	Why the HELL is there the NULL statement?????????????
> 
> There's only one use as far as I can tell...to fill an empty procedure/
> function declaration so that the body isn't empty.  So why not just allow
> an empty body?

I don't know the "official" answer to your question, but I would like to
offer two possibilities.

	You can use the NULL statement as one alternative of a conditonal
	accept, or as an alternative in a conditonal.  In both cases, it
	would be analogous to the FORTRAN  or C "continue".

	Ada is very strict about a programmer being explicit.  If you want
	to do something (or nothing) you must say so.  Having a NULL statement
	to tell the world that you are not doing anything is consistent with 
	this philosophy.

Good luck with the class,
Dave