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From: "Randy Brukardt" <randy@rrsoftware.com>
Newsgroups: comp.lang.ada
Subject: Re: Bug in Ada (SuSe 10.2) ?
Date: Thu, 21 Feb 2008 16:32:27 -0600
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Date: 2008-02-21T16:32:27-06:00
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<billjones6789@yahoo.com> wrote in message
news:c8a646bf-47b0-43e6-ae46-d5f820126b07@n77g2000hse.googlegroups.com...
>
> Jean-Pierre Rosen wrote:
> > Hmm... maybe we coud suggest to AdaCore (anybody listening?) that the
> > GPL version should have the checks on by default, ...
> Including checks for dangling pointers??

We're talking about language-defined checks. There are no language-defined
checks for dangling pointers!

> There is no mention in the Ada RM of "default compiler switches",
> just "standard mode" and optionally "nonstandard modes".  So as long
> as -gnato is considered part of "standard mode", there not any
> technical problem calling it an Ada compiler (assuming of course that
> "all legal compilation_units are accepted").

That's the legalistic answer, of course, but it doesn't answer the practical
point: it should be easiest for new users of a compiler to compile in
"standard mode". And, sadly, that is not true for Gnat. The result is a
steady stream of questions to this forum (and most likely elsewhere) from
people who are confused by getting a not-quite-Ada compiler out of the box.

More generally, simply meeting the standard in some fashion does not
necessarily make an implementation practically useful as an Ada
implementation. Neither the Standard nor the ACATS have anything to say
about usability.

                                     Randy.