Re: Uninitialized out parameters

["W. Wesley Groleau (Wes)" <wwgrol@PSESERV3.FW.HAC.COM>]

Bob Duff pointed out that in Ada, OFTEN the compiler cannot tell whether
a variable has been initialized and suggested that giving warnings in
these cases are a big pain.

(They're worse than a pain if they induce programmers to turn off all
warnings.)

Sometimes, the only reason the compiler can't tell is due to separate
compilation.  Another thread has already beat to death the reason why this
is not true of GNAT.  If you're not using gnat, independent tools do exist
that can change the "unknown" to "correct" or "wrong" in many cases.

How about having a compiler make an optional SINGLE warning for each
invokation something like:

    COMPILER WAS UNABLE TO DETERMINE WHETHER THE FOLLOWING
        ITEMS WERE INITIALIZED BEFORE BEING REFERENCED:

Identifier                    File                                Line No.
----------------------------  ----------------------------------  --------
PKG.PROC.PROC.VRBL.FIELD      some_ada_source_file.ada              65,736
.....

Yes, go ahead and use this example to justify putting
thousands of lines in a source file.  NOT!   :-)

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