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=ham autolearn_force=no version=3.4.4 X-Google-Thread: 103376,7272aa7508a3d83f X-Google-Attributes: gid103376,public X-Google-Language: ENGLISH,ASCII-7-bit Path: g2news1.google.com!news4.google.com!newshub.sdsu.edu!elnk-nf2-pas!newsfeed.earthlink.net!stamper.news.pas.earthlink.net!newsread2.news.pas.earthlink.net.POSTED!a6202946!not-for-mail From: "Jeffrey R. Carter" Organization: jrcarter at acm dot org User-Agent: Mozilla/5.0 (Windows; U; Windows NT 5.1; en-US; rv:1.7.12) Gecko/20050915 X-Accept-Language: en-us, en MIME-Version: 1.0 Newsgroups: comp.lang.ada Subject: Re: pointer questions References: In-Reply-To: Content-Type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii; format=flowed Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit Message-ID: Date: Fri, 28 Oct 2005 21:24:25 GMT NNTP-Posting-Host: 67.3.212.184 X-Complaints-To: abuse@earthlink.net X-Trace: newsread2.news.pas.earthlink.net 1130534665 67.3.212.184 (Fri, 28 Oct 2005 14:24:25 PDT) NNTP-Posting-Date: Fri, 28 Oct 2005 14:24:25 PDT Xref: g2news1.google.com comp.lang.ada:6040 Date: 2005-10-28T21:24:25+00:00 List-Id: Robert A Duff wrote: > An abstract syntax tree for Ada will have upwards of a hundred different > tagged types (or variants, if you go the variant record route). And you > need access types all over the place, because these things are highly > recursive. Sounds as if compilers need access types much more than many other kinds of programs. > You and I might have to wait a long time for that, given that I have to > make a living. I can do so making compilers and other tools, but since > the Ada 9X project, nobody seems interested in paying me to do language > design. Sigh. For now, it's a hobby. Sounds like a fun hobby. I've thought about trying to design a language (which I would call NINA: NINA Is Not Ada), but every time someone posts a "why not add this feature" question and I think about what it would entail, LLs like you come up with several factors I hadn't thought of. So it seems I shouldn't be in the language design business anytime soon. > I don't even know what to call it. Not "Duff", for sure. ;-) OK. I'll look forward to hearing more about Not "Duff" :) > Just saying "You hardly ever need pointers in Ada" is misleading, > IMHO. Perhaps. To a certain extent, I intend it to provoke, so the person thinks about the possibility that Ada is significantly different from C, and he's not going to learn Ada by trying to do things the same way as in C. -- Jeff Carter "Blessed are they who convert their neighbors' oxen, for they shall inhibit their girth." Monty Python's Life of Brian 83