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From: billwolf%hazel.cs.clemson.edu@hubcap.clemson.edu (William Thomas Wolfe,2847,)
Newsgroups: comp.lang.ada
Subject: Re: What is the origin of `pragma'
Message-ID: <5937@hubcap.clemson.edu>
Date: 6 Jul 89 16:55:52 GMT
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>From rcd@ico.ISC.COM (Dick Dunn):
> fmoore@skvax1.csc.ti.com (Freeman Moore [214]995-1901) writes:
>>    Why was the word `pragma' selected?
> ALGOL 68 has a construct called a "pragmat" with very similar usage. 

    Nevertheless, it's not a very intuitively appealing keyword;
    most people learning Ada don't say "Ah, yes, from the Latin..."
    (or whatever)... rather, it's a counter-intuitive thing to be
    memorized.

    We simply want to give some directive to the compiler, so probably 
    something along the lines of "Compiler:" would be a better choice! 


    Bill Wolfe, wtwolfe@hubcap.clemson.edu