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: 103376,47bc849aad30d586 X-Google-Attributes: gid103376,public X-Google-ArrivalTime: 2002-05-31 09:25:18 PST Path: archiver1.google.com!postnews1.google.com!not-for-mail From: dennison@telepath.com (Ted Dennison) Newsgroups: comp.lang.ada Subject: Re: A standard package for config files is needed Date: 31 May 2002 09:25:18 -0700 Organization: http://groups.google.com/ Message-ID: <4519e058.0205310825.868fe4a@posting.google.com> References: <3CF5D7AC.975B0DB3@cs.tu-berlin.de> NNTP-Posting-Host: 65.115.221.98 Content-Type: text/plain; charset=ISO-8859-1 Content-Transfer-Encoding: 8bit X-Trace: posting.google.com 1022862318 20914 127.0.0.1 (31 May 2002 16:25:18 GMT) X-Complaints-To: groups-abuse@google.com NNTP-Posting-Date: 31 May 2002 16:25:18 GMT Xref: archiver1.google.com comp.lang.ada:25094 Date: 2002-05-31T16:25:18+00:00 List-Id: "Marin David Condic" wrote in message news:... > Building a data structure in memory and moving it in/out via Streams > provides an answer that is simple & portable to any platform. (You'd still No its not. There's nothing in the Ada standard that says the data written out to streams has to be portable, or even what its format is at all. I think the order subobjects of compound structures get written out is specified, but that's about it. Configuration files generated via this method will not work with another compiler, will probably not work on another platform, and are not even guaranteed to work with *the same* compiler after an upgrade (unless your vendor cares to give you that guarantee). Also realise that for many programs, developing their own tools to allow users to change the settings would be a real pain. Not every program is an interactive GUI app. With a text file you can lay all the options out there for the user, and even add comments to explain *why* the settings were put where they currently are. You can't easily do that with a program (particuarly an embeded or real-time app with no user interface). -- T.E.D. Home - mailto:dennison@telepath.com (Yahoo: Ted_Dennison) Homepage - http://www.telepath.com/dennison/Ted/TED.html