From mboxrd@z Thu Jan 1 00:00:00 1970 X-Spam-Checker-Version: SpamAssassin 3.4.4 (2020-01-24) on polar.synack.me X-Spam-Level: X-Spam-Status: No, score=-1.9 required=5.0 tests=BAYES_00 autolearn=unavailable autolearn_force=no version=3.4.4 X-Received: by 10.50.73.198 with SMTP id n6mr13789866igv.6.1434043486132; Thu, 11 Jun 2015 10:24:46 -0700 (PDT) X-Received: by 10.182.33.10 with SMTP id n10mr86636obi.18.1434043486072; Thu, 11 Jun 2015 10:24:46 -0700 (PDT) Path: eternal-september.org!reader01.eternal-september.org!reader02.eternal-september.org!news.eternal-september.org!mx02.eternal-september.org!feeder.eternal-september.org!news.glorb.com!h15no1692955igd.0!news-out.google.com!kd3ni3175igb.0!nntp.google.com!h15no1961746igd.0!postnews.google.com!glegroupsg2000goo.googlegroups.com!not-for-mail Newsgroups: comp.lang.ada Date: Thu, 11 Jun 2015 10:24:45 -0700 (PDT) Complaints-To: groups-abuse@google.com Injection-Info: glegroupsg2000goo.googlegroups.com; posting-host=73.138.95.40; posting-account=wEPvUgoAAABrLeiz_LRhQ3jeEhyfWVMH NNTP-Posting-Host: 73.138.95.40 User-Agent: G2/1.0 MIME-Version: 1.0 Message-ID: Subject: Ada Procedure Parameters That Use the Plus Sign From: NiGHTS Injection-Date: Thu, 11 Jun 2015 17:24:46 +0000 Content-Type: text/plain; charset=ISO-8859-1 Xref: news.eternal-september.org comp.lang.ada:26269 Date: 2015-06-11T10:24:45-07:00 List-Id: I recently stumbled across some Ada code that appends a plus sign in front of a parameter name of a function or procedure call. From the context it seems like it is doing a forced cast between two incompatible types. Here is one example I found in the AdaGtk demo create_tree_view.adb line 243: Gtk_New (Tree, +Model); My questions are: 1. What is this called? Is there a name for this? 2. What exactly is happening here? 3. Is it safe? Should it be avoided? 4. Is there another way to accomplish this without the use of '+' ? 5. Where can I find out more about this? Thank you for your help.