On Fri, 5 Apr 2013, Dmitry A. Kazakov wrote: > On Fri, 5 Apr 2013 14:45:55 +0200, Stefan.Lucks@uni-weimar.de wrote: > >> But what reasons would you have to actually mix >> narrow, Wide_ and Wide_Wide_ Strings? > > What is at least one reason to distinguish them? I agree with you that there is no reason to distinguish between them. The entire distinction narrow, Wide_ and Wide_Wide_ Strings (and Characters) is a historical artifact, no more, no less. But if there is no reason to disting between them -- there is no reason to mix them either! Right now, the best you can do if you really have to use different of these String types is the following: 1. convert everything into a single type (probably Wide_Wide_String), 2. do your work. 3. and convert back (if you really have to). > Once answered, please name a reason to distinguish UTF-16, UTF-8, UCS-2 etc > strings in assignment, comparison, concatenation. I agree, there is none. Which is precicely why one should not need any mixed-representation operations. > The difference between Randy and me, is that he wants to scrap all > operations Ada 83 strings had. Since this would be clearly incompatible > with existing programs, he wants to add them as completely new types, as if > we had not enough string types in the language already. I think, I agree with Randy here. The old bunch of strings are a mess, that has historically evolved and is far beyond repair. Trying to repair it by adding support for mixed operations gives birth to a gazillion of new cockroaches. ------ I love the taste of Cryptanalysis in the morning! ------ --Stefan.Lucks (at) uni-weimar.de, Bauhaus-Universität Weimar, Germany--