Re: Renaming of enumeration constant

["Nick Roberts" <nick.roberts@acm.org>]

"Jean-Pierre Rosen" <rosen@adalog.fr> wrote in message
news:n3ubac.l3a.ln@skymaster...

> > My own opinion is that constants are silly in Ada, but they were
> > introduced in Ada 83 (and its predecessors), long before the question
> > of inheritance was understood to be important.

> Sorry, but this statement is wrong.

> Before he wrote the LIS compiler (one of Ada's ancestors), Ichbiah was
> famous for writing the first Simula compiler in France. He understood
> perfectly well inheritance. The absence of inheritance in Ada 83 was
> deliberate, and derived types were introduced in Ada83 because Ichbiah
> insisted on it, due to his previous experience.

Exactly my point, Jean-Pierre, actually! Jean Ichbiah understood the
importance of being able to derive types -- and thank the Lord that he
did -- but very few other people connected with the development of the
Ada language did. There is documentary evidence of this. I have read, in
several places, comments on derivation in Ada 83 such as "but this
feature is not expected to be often used."

Jean Ichbiah was brilliant, and well worthy of being considered the father
of the Ada language. I think the fact that Ada 83's inheritance turned out
to be the trump card in the design of Ada 95 is testimony to his unique
foresight.

-- 
Nick Roberts