Re: private type discriminants ignored?

[nobody@REPLAY.COM (Anonymous)]

<35460201.ED1315C4@hso.link.com> <354612AF.41C6@hso.link.com>
<35468F93.C371940@hso.link.com>

On Wed, 29 Apr 1998 22:30:08 GMT, robertduff@world.std.com (Robert A
Duff) wrote:

> ...
> For such variables a compiler will either allocate the max size, or use
> the heap implicitly to grow and shrink the thing behind the scenes.  I
> prefer the former implementation in a fairly low-level, machine-oriented
> language like Ada.  On the other hand, the deallocate/reallocate scheme
> gives useful flexibility.  On the third hand, the first compiler I used

--                                  third hand!

> that tried that scheme had a bug -- if you renamed a component of such a
> record, the compiler would store the address of the renamed component,
> but then when the discriminant changed, the whole record would move, and
> the renaming would be a dangling pointer.  I believe at least one other
> compiler did it right, by doing the dealloc/realloc thing on just the
> parts that change size depending on the discrim (and you're not allowed
> to rename those components).
> 
> ...

Now we know the truth: Robert A. Duff is a Motie!

Jeff Carter  PGP:1024/440FBE21
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