Re: Q: access to subprogram

[jsa@organon.com (Jon S Anthony)]

In article <dewar.836627383@schonberg> dewar@cs.nyu.edu (Robert Dewar) writes:

> Jon said
> 
> "I can maybe buy the second bit (about difficulty for display based
> impls) but the first makes no sense.  You wouldn't have to pass
> displays or whatever in those cases where the feature wasn't being
> used.  Which means that there is _no_ distributed overhead for the
> 99+% of regular ol' subprogram calls."
> 
> If you buy the second bit, and if you agree that displays are more
> efficient than static links for Ada programs (which is not gospel,
> it requires discussion and examination -- I certainly think it is
> the case), then the first bit is a consequence, since the provision
> of closures would push you away from using displays, and hence 
> introduce distributed overhead -- that was what was being talked about.

I don't see how, as most programs will not have _any_ nesting.
Period.  So displays or static links are irrelevant for nearly all
cases.  So, the issue is irrelevant to [probably not even hyperbole
here] 99+% of subprogram calls.  Which means that there really is no
distributed overhead (at least not as I understand the term).

/Jon
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Jon Anthony
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