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: 1014db,690ce1f62160d05a X-Google-Attributes: gid1014db,public X-Google-Thread: 103376,690ce1f62160d05a X-Google-Attributes: gid103376,public X-Google-Thread: 109fba,690ce1f62160d05a X-Google-Attributes: gid109fba,public X-Google-Thread: 1094ba,690ce1f62160d05a X-Google-Attributes: gid1094ba,public From: "E. Robert Tisdale" Subject: Re: How to Design an Application Programmers' Interface (API) Date: 2000/08/11 Message-ID: <39940266.15161093@netwood.net>#1/1 X-Deja-AN: 657179855 Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit References: <39921178.819F6DCB@netwood.net> <399386EF.4F2AA3E6@netwood.net> <6K+0jFPPKxTo@eisner.decus.org> X-Accept-Language: en Content-Type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii X-Complaints-To: newsabuse@supernews.com Organization: Posted via Supernews, http://www.supernews.com MIME-Version: 1.0 Newsgroups: comp.lang.c++,comp.lang.c,comp.lang.fortran,comp.lang.ada Date: 2000-08-11T00:00:00+00:00 List-Id: Larry Kilgallen wrote: > But library developers and application programmers > can work independently even with a lousy API design, > so long as they use the Ada language. > Write the specification for the library first > (it can even be written by the application programmer) > and then have each side code using that specification. Please explain what you mean by API. I believe that your specification is a specification of the API or, at least, the specification of the Ada language binding. > > An API is a contract > > between library developers and application programmers. > > And the implementation of that contract > is the specification of the library package. > > If you are going to post these generalities to the Ada newsgroup, > please be aware of the features of the Ada language. Why? Because Ada deals with them formally and explicitly? I'm not advocating any one computer programming language over another. But please feel free to do so if you wish.