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-Language: ENGLISH,ASCII-7-bit X-Google-Thread: 103376,38c827f7e800d317 X-Google-Attributes: gid103376,public X-Google-ArrivalTime: 2003-06-27 15:10:35 PST Path: archiver1.google.com!postnews1.google.com!not-for-mail From: aek@vib.usr.pu.ru (Alexander Kopilovitch) Newsgroups: comp.lang.ada Subject: Re: conversion Date: 27 Jun 2003 15:10:35 -0700 Organization: http://groups.google.com/ Message-ID: References: NNTP-Posting-Host: 195.242.16.112 Content-Type: text/plain; charset=ISO-8859-1 Content-Transfer-Encoding: 8bit X-Trace: posting.google.com 1056751835 1632 127.0.0.1 (27 Jun 2003 22:10:35 GMT) X-Complaints-To: groups-abuse@google.com NNTP-Posting-Date: 27 Jun 2003 22:10:35 GMT Xref: archiver1.google.com comp.lang.ada:39851 Date: 2003-06-27T22:10:35+00:00 List-Id: Preben Randhol wrote: > > Certainly, a chorus tells you that Ada is not C, but what about Pascal, which > > has much more resemblance with Ada? Pascal isn't C, it does not rely heavily > > upon pointers, but at the same time it has quite good and usable strings. > >Oh I remembered when we had to use Pascal in some introductory >programming course at the university that there was several machines >crashing due to that the students didn't get the pointers correctly. Is it all you remember about Pascal? If so that, perhaps, you should not be much surprised when other people associate Ada with Ariane 5 crash only. Anyway, why you switched to the Pascal pointers from the theme of strings? Pascal is not C, and Pascal strings aren't naturally associated with pointers. Finally, as you mention those dangerous pointers in Pascal, let me quote the "Programming in Ada 95" by John Barnes (2nd edition, 1998), Chapter 10, Access Types, p.171 : "Playing with pointers is like playing with fire. Fire is perhaps the most important tool known to man. Carefully used, fire brings enormous benefits, but when fire gets out of control, disaster strikes. Pointers have similar characteristics but are well tamed in the form of access types in Ada." Alexander Kopilovitch aek@vib.usr.pu.ru Saint-Petersburg Russia