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=-1.3 required=5.0 tests=BAYES_00,INVALID_MSGID autolearn=no autolearn_force=no version=3.4.4 X-Google-Language: ENGLISH,ASCII-7-bit X-Google-Thread: 103376,66752102482bbdca X-Google-Attributes: gid103376,public From: "Robert I. Eachus" Subject: Re: Required Metrics Date: 2000/05/19 Message-ID: <3924CE4F.A96C5AC5@earthlink.net>#1/1 X-Deja-AN: 625279887 Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit References: <5DDO4.2237$wb7.194854@news.flash.net> <8ek4ea$5ta$1@nnrp1.deja.com> <8es65n$5hn$1@nnrp1.deja.com> <%MoQ4.7915$wb7.556168@news.flash.net> <8eulom$u8m$1@nnrp1.deja.com> <3914F1DC.A5EE1751@earthlink.net> <8f3tfl$d32$1@nnrp1.deja.com> <39233EC6.C4738579@earthlink.net> X-Accept-Language: en,pdf Content-Type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii X-Complaints-To: abuse@earthlink.net X-Trace: newsread1.prod.itd.earthlink.net 958713326 63.24.55.53 (Thu, 18 May 2000 22:15:26 PDT) Organization: The MITRE Corporation MIME-Version: 1.0 NNTP-Posting-Date: Thu, 18 May 2000 22:15:26 PDT Newsgroups: comp.lang.ada Date: 2000-05-19T00:00:00+00:00 List-Id: Robert A Duff wrote: > That test is clearly wrong. I'm surprised nobody has challenged it. > There is no requirement that a compiler impose a maximum line-length > limit, and there never has been. > I guess it's easier to make your compiler pass a test than it is to go > through the challenge process. Sigh. If the test is still in the suite, it definitely should be challenged. The Ada 95 rules explicitly allow the maximum identifier length to be different from the maximum line length. However, in the early days of Ada 83 validation--around ACVC 1.4--you were faced with an impossible Catch-22. You could argue that the test had to be modified for your implementation, but you still had to demonstrate somehow, that an identifier of maximum length was accepted, and an identifier of maximum length + 1 was either rejected by the compiler, or impossible to create in a file. And yes, we took the easy way out on the compiler for the Honeywell DPS6. The "real" maximum line length for {normal} text files was 255 characters. It was MUCH easier to set the maximum Ada source file line length to 253 and pass the ACVC test as written, than to try to demonstrate that we couldn't create a non-standard file containing an identifier longer than the maximum line length. (The choice of 253 was for consistancy with Ada Text_IO files, where we needed a couple extra characters for new page and end of file makers.)