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: 103376,38159b1b5557a2e7 X-Google-Attributes: gid103376,public X-Google-ArrivalTime: 2004-01-23 04:52:18 PST Path: archiver1.google.com!news2.google.com!news.maxwell.syr.edu!newshub.sdsu.edu!elnk-nf2-pas!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: <401118FD.701@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: Standard Ada Preprocessor (Was: why ada is so unpopular ?) References: <49cbf610.0401170627.79c3dfe5@posting.google.com> <400A9B48.3060100@noplace.com> <400BD4B5.6000307@noplace.com> <400BDB7C.40100@noplace.com> <400D2150.6000705@noplace.com> <400E72F9.8060501@noplace.com> <100upo7ln5e3k59@corp.supernews.com> Content-Type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii; format=flowed Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit Date: Fri, 23 Jan 2004 12:52:17 GMT NNTP-Posting-Host: 209.165.26.148 X-Complaints-To: abuse@earthlink.net X-Trace: newsread3.news.atl.earthlink.net 1074862337 209.165.26.148 (Fri, 23 Jan 2004 04:52:17 PST) NNTP-Posting-Date: Fri, 23 Jan 2004 04:52:17 PST Organization: EarthLink Inc. -- http://www.EarthLink.net Xref: archiver1.google.com comp.lang.ada:4701 Date: 2004-01-23T12:52:17+00:00 List-Id: O.K. But we always had that capability. Right now I could write a package and call it "Configuration" (or whatever) and house in it a bunch of different strings that tell me what is or is not available in a particular compiler/target/version/etc arrangement. But unless you can actually *do* something with that info, having it available is totally useless. By the time I'm running and can read it and branch around some piece of code - its too late. I need it to solve issues at compile time - where a given compiler can't even see a given statement or it will choke. Perhaps a pragma that took some constant string and compared it to a string literal and compiled the associated code only if equal would be sufficient. I could build my "package Configuration" and have something like pragma If_Equal (Configuration.OS => "TOPS 10", ) ; It would be a cheap fix that minimizes the impact to any existing packages or code and only requires compile-time interpretation of a pragma - something compilers already do. MDC Robert A Duff wrote: > > Anyway, it seems to me that the whole idea of System.System_Name could > never work, unless there were some world-wide registry of names. > Much easier to let individual projects roll their own -- they know > what systems they (currently) support, and they know whether they care > about the target hardware, or the target OS, or the Ada compiler, > or whatever. > > - Bob -- ====================================================================== 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 ======================================================================