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=-1.9 required=5.0 tests=BAYES_00 autolearn=ham autolearn_force=no version=3.4.4 X-Google-Language: ENGLISH,ASCII-7-bit X-Google-Thread: 103376,b6e97963d32ee242 X-Google-Attributes: gid103376,public X-Google-ArrivalTime: 2003-05-24 22:38:41 PST Path: archiver1.google.com!news1.google.com!newsfeed.stanford.edu!logbridge.uoregon.edu!arclight.uoregon.edu!wn13feed!worldnet.att.net!204.127.198.203!attbi_feed3!attbi.com!rwcrnsc53.POSTED!not-for-mail Message-ID: <3ED056CB.8000200@attbi.com> From: "Robert I. Eachus" User-Agent: Mozilla/5.0 (Windows; U; Windows NT 5.0; en-US; rv:1.0.2) Gecko/20021120 Netscape/7.01 X-Accept-Language: en-us, en MIME-Version: 1.0 Newsgroups: comp.lang.ada Subject: Re: The old "Object.Method" syntax debate References: <254c16a.0305210726.485125de@posting.google.com> <3eccdf77$1@epflnews.epfl.ch> <3ecdd296$1@epflnews.epfl.ch> Content-Type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii; format=flowed Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit NNTP-Posting-Host: 24.62.164.137 X-Complaints-To: abuse@attbi.com X-Trace: rwcrnsc53 1053841120 24.62.164.137 (Sun, 25 May 2003 05:38:40 GMT) NNTP-Posting-Date: Sun, 25 May 2003 05:38:40 GMT Organization: AT&T Broadband Date: Sun, 25 May 2003 05:38:40 GMT Xref: archiver1.google.com comp.lang.ada:37745 Date: 2003-05-25T05:38:40+00:00 List-Id: Alexander Kopilovitch wrote: > Dmitry A. Kazakov wrote: > >>Anyway prefix syntax exists also in the form of attributes. > > > Yes, but attributes cannot be introduced by user -- sometimes programmer can > provide an implementation of an attribute, but isn't permitted to introduce > his own attribute... this is a privilege for language designers and compiler > vendors. > (An apostrophe often is no more visible that a dot, but its upper position > in the line suggests that the following attribute somehow came from a high > authority -:) . I really don't like the idea of allowing the Object.Operation format to Ada. Yeah, the compilers can usually figure it out understand it. But the potential confusion with component notation is going to confuse experienced Ada users. (And eventually other O-O language users when the actually run into component references. Since the language currently allows defining attributes which are procedures or functions, why not use the apostrophe notation? Now the meaning of Object'Operation is clear, even when it is actually Object'Length or whatever. Probably need a rule about overloading predefined attributes, but that shouldn't be such a big deal. (They would be non-overridable declarations in scope.)