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From: Mats Karlssohn <mats@mida.se>
Newsgroups: comp.lang.ada
Subject: Re: Compile time executed functions
Date: Wed, 28 Mar 2001 09:08:01 +0200
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Xref: supernews.google.com comp.lang.ada:6152
Date: 2001-03-28T07:37:23+00:00
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Ken Garlington wrote:
> 
> I think the key statement is "The constant is really a constant and should
> therefore be placed in ROM."

Well actually, I intended that to be one of the keystatements.
The simple cases (like "Foo : constant Integer := 4;") seems to work
for me already (using GNAT and adapted linker script).

> AFAIK, you can create an _Ada_ constant from a function. Whether it's placed
> in ROM is a concept outside the scope of the language, and is a function of
> compiler optimizations.

Agreed, the placement of the constant is not a Ada language issue.

> A more general solution, as you noted, is to write an Ada program that
> writes an easier-to-optimize Ada program (or, in some cases, assembly
> instructions). We have several of those for commonly-used capabilities in
> our domain.

And I currently does not feel that good about that solution. Most of
the practical issuses,like different project members using old, or
even worse own versions of the table generator (wich is not included
in configuration management) can (add WILL) be solved by some more
project regulations.

The other issue is that I feel that within Ada's expressive powers
it would be useful to have _some_ of the possibilities that is
availible when using C++ templates and/or C preprocessor macros.
(Please, no flames on the two 'bad words' above!)

-- 
Mats Karlssohn, developer                         mailto:mats@mida.se  
Mida Systemutveckling AB                          http://www.mida.se
Box 64, S-732 22 ARBOGA, SWEDEN
Phone: +46-(0)589-89808   Fax: +46-(0)589-89809