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From: sommar@enea.se (Erland Sommarskog)
Newsgroups: comp.lang.ada
Subject: Re: Command line arguments
Message-ID: <3331@enea.se>
Date: 6 May 91 21:56:11 GMT
References: <3275@enea.se> <1991Apr30.135735.1211@iplmail.orl.mmc.com> <61952@masscomp.westford.ccur.com>
Organization: Enea Data AB, Sweden
List-Id: <comp.lang.ada>

Also sprach Steve Gabrilowitz (sag@iplmail.orl.mmc.com):
)I said:
)|) (*) Yes, I know that argc/argv is commonly available with C
)|) implementations. But if you're going to get the command-line
)|) interface right in, say, VMS, you better use the CLI$ routines.
)
)Not exactly true.  The argc/argv will work fine under VMS without using the
)CLI$ routines if the program is invoked via a symbol:
)
)$ TESTP :== $SYS$USER:[STEVE]TESTP.EXE
)$ TESTP 1 2 3

And then Joe Orost (joeo@masscomp.westford.ccur.com) raised his voice:
)The C language forces the UNIX style of command arguments onto different
)systems, and in doing so, has achieved a certain level of portability.
)
)Why can't the Ada language do the same thing (or even follow C's lead
)and also specify the UNIX conventions)?  [In fact, POSIX/Ada provides this.]

This isn't really an Ada issue, so be careful when/if you followup.

As a person living with Unix as a your every-day world, would you
fancy a facility with options like /[NO]QUALIFIER=KEYWORD?

Give me an VMS utility where I'm supposed to give qualifiers as -d2,
and if looks could kill you would be a dead man.

Portability is a virtue but user-friendliness and conformance to
the environment conformance are higher virtues.

That's why you should not use argv/argc on VMS (unless you really
want do CDU parsing on your own), but use the CLI$ routines instead.
-- 
Erland Sommarskog - ENEA Data, Stockholm - sommar@enea.se
WORLD CHAMPIONS IN ICE HOCKEY 1991 - S W E D E N!