RE: Latin_1 and portability

[Kilgallen@SpamCop.net (Larry Kilgallen)]

In article <mailman.110.1071282456.31149.comp.lang.ada@ada-france.org>, "amado.alves" <amado.alves@netcabo.pt> writes:
> <<
> Are you saying that some implementations of TEXT_IO.GET_LINE do not
> handle OS terminals properly ?
> 
> I thought GET_LINE was the way around OS-dependencies in this area.
>>>
> =20
> I find this fascinating. You can have an X-conventioned text file in a Y =
> system, where X and Y are operating systems (with distinct end of line =
> conventions). If you compile your Ada program to the Y target, it will =
> not read the X file properly. Amongs other unwarranted effects. Thit is =
> why I adopt an 1-N conversion approach. Say 8-bit characters. I use =
> Latin_1.NEL for end of line in the main application (the "1" side), and =
> provide (simple) converters to/from the N conventions.

That depends on your transfer mechanism.  ISO-9660 includes an indicator
regarding which of the 4 major EOL indicators is used in a file, and the
OS can readily honor that.  I have been told that some TCP/IP implementations
do conversion on the fly.

Taking random bits from one operating system to another is bound to fail
when the operating systems expects a particular format (text file). This
is no an Ada problem.