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,ac02560f0af03a21 X-Google-Attributes: gid103376,public X-Google-ArrivalTime: 2004-01-01 06:17:27 PST Path: archiver1.google.com!news2.google.com!newsfeed2.dallas1.level3.net!news.level3.com!crtntx1-snh1.gtei.net!news.gtei.net!newsfeed1.easynews.com!easynews.com!easynews!elnk-pas-nf1!newsfeed.earthlink.net!stamper.news.pas.earthlink.net!stamper.news.atl.earthlink.net!newsread3.news.atl.earthlink.net.POSTED!d9c68f36!not-for-mail Message-ID: <3FF42BE4.6080607@noplace.com> From: Marin David Condic User-Agent: Mozilla/5.0 (Windows; U; Windows NT 5.1; en-US; rv:1.0.1) Gecko/20020823 Netscape/7.0 (OEM-HPQ-PRS1C03) X-Accept-Language: en-us, en MIME-Version: 1.0 Newsgroups: comp.lang.ada Subject: Re: GNAT parameter passing, C-style? References: <3FEC43B2.5080606@noplace.com> <1072450300.440355@master.nyc.kbcfp.com> <3FEC4E89.2070804@noplace.com> <1072458199.346049@master.nyc.kbcfp.com> <3fec7c21$0$4764$61fed72c@news.rcn.com> <4iBIb.8173$qS3.498@nwrdny03.gnilink.net> <1072883131.278899@master.nyc.kbcfp.com> <3FF39615.7070408@noplace.com> Content-Type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii; format=flowed Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit Date: Thu, 01 Jan 2004 14:17:27 GMT NNTP-Posting-Host: 165.247.67.219 X-Complaints-To: abuse@earthlink.net X-Trace: newsread3.news.atl.earthlink.net 1072966647 165.247.67.219 (Thu, 01 Jan 2004 06:17:27 PST) NNTP-Posting-Date: Thu, 01 Jan 2004 06:17:27 PST Organization: EarthLink Inc. -- http://www.EarthLink.net Xref: archiver1.google.com comp.lang.ada:4012 Date: 2004-01-01T14:17:27+00:00 List-Id: It may very well be the common way it is done on most - or even all - implementations of C and Pascal. But that is saying something very different from a claim that it is part of the language. And if it is not a defined part of the language, it means an implementation is free to do it any way they want. Hence it cannot be counted on as *always* being true of a conforming implementation - and programmers are often mislead by that sort of misunderstanding. I remember many years ago discussing Ada and portability with another programmer. She said that she was going to recommend to her boss that the next development be done in C because Ada's I/O wasn't portable. I wanted to know why she thought that was true and she showed me the code they were working on. Their project was making use of Digital Equipment Corporation's "Starlet" package for I/O and she was concluding from this fact that Ada didn't have portable I/O. I hauled out the RM and showed her Text_IO, etc., and found the C interface to Starlet and tried to explain that Ada *did* have portable I/O - just that her project wasn't making use of it and it was no different for C. I think she understood at that point, but she looked a little unconvinced. Lots of programmers travel on bad or misleading information about programming languages. Most of them are not exactly Rocket Scientists (I'll be glad to help them in that respect! :-) and all they know is what they see in their day-to-day work with one specific implementation of a language. (Experiment: Pick some feature of the MFC that is not part of C++ and is unique to MFC. Ask a dozen programmers who use MSVC++ "Does C++ have feature X?" Bet money most will say "Yes") It is exactly this sort of misunderstanding that leads your garden variety programmer to conclude "Ada is inherently slow because all implementations I've seen are slow..." or "Ada isn't able to do civilian programming since it was built for the military" That's why I get overly cautious with claims like "C passes parameters this way..." when there isn't any such requirement in the C standard. MDC Luke A. Guest wrote: > > So, as far as I am concerned there is still a C & PASCAL convention, it's > just a matter of how the compiler works I suppose. > > Luke. > -- ====================================================================== Marin David Condic I work for: http://www.belcan.com/ My project is: http://www.jsf.mil/NSFrames.htm Send Replies To: m o d c @ a m o g c n i c . r "Face it ladies, its not the dress that makes you look fat. Its the FAT that makes you look fat." -- Al Bundy ======================================================================