From mboxrd@z Thu Jan  1 00:00:00 1970
X-Spam-Checker-Version: SpamAssassin 3.4.4 (2020-01-24) on polar.synack.me
X-Spam-Level: 
X-Spam-Status: No, score=0.7 required=5.0 tests=BAYES_00,INVALID_DATE,
	REPLYTO_WITHOUT_TO_CC autolearn=no autolearn_force=no version=3.4.4
Path: utzoo!utgpu!news-server.csri.toronto.edu!mailrus!usenet.ins.cwru.edu!tut.cis.ohio-state.edu!zaphod.mps.ohio-state.edu!think!barmar
From: barmar@think.com (Barry Margolin)
Newsgroups: comp.lang.ada
Subject: Re: Missing accept statement
Message-ID: <34752@news.Think.COM>
Date: 17 Mar 90 06:01:01 GMT
References: <1990Mar15.203521.28171@planck.uucp> <4623@cbnewsl.ATT.COM>
Sender: news@Think.COM
Reply-To: barmar@nugodot.think.com.UUCP (Barry Margolin)
Organization: Thinking Machines Corporation, Cambridge MA, USA
List-Id: <comp.lang.ada>

In article <4623@cbnewsl.ATT.COM> arny@cbnewsl.ATT.COM (arny.b.engelson,wh,) writes:
>The real question is "was it the intention of the language designers to
>allow tasks to have zero accept statements for an entry?"  Well guys,
>was it?  More questions: If so, why?  Is this really a good idea?

I certainly can't speak for the language designers, but to me it seems
reasonable to permit this.  During development of a program you may want to
compile and test a program before it's complete.  The incomplete program
may not have all its accept statements written yet.  This is true even if
there are entry calls for the unwritten accepts, since you may be testing
the code paths that avoid these entry calls.

As you said, it would be reasonable for a compiler to warn about this case.
There's no reason for an incomplete program to compile without warning --
this can save you from inadvertently shipping a program that's missing an
important piece.

--
Barry Margolin, Thinking Machines Corp.

barmar@think.com
{uunet,harvard}!think!barmar