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: 103376,3a1c64628a09855b X-Google-Attributes: gid103376,domainid0,public,usenet X-Google-Language: ENGLISH,ASCII-7-bit Path: g2news1.google.com!news1.google.com!news.glorb.com!peer1.news.newnet.co.uk!194.159.246.34.MISMATCH!peer-uk.news.demon.net!kibo.news.demon.net!mutlu.news.demon.net!news.demon.co.uk!demon!not-for-mail From: John McCabe Newsgroups: comp.lang.ada Subject: Re: Lack of formal syntax undermines Ada Date: Fri, 11 Apr 2008 23:37:53 +0100 Message-ID: References: NNTP-Posting-Host: assen.demon.co.uk Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit X-Trace: news.demon.co.uk 1207953485 12114 80.176.146.77 (11 Apr 2008 22:38:05 GMT) X-Complaints-To: abuse@demon.net NNTP-Posting-Date: Fri, 11 Apr 2008 22:38:05 +0000 (UTC) X-Newsreader: Forte Free Agent 2.0/32.652 Xref: g2news1.google.com comp.lang.ada:20885 Date: 2008-04-11T23:37:53+01:00 List-Id: Robert A Duff wrote: >John McCabe writes: > >> As I understand it, that was deliberate; Ada's feature that functions >> may not have side-effects ... > >Ada functions can have side effects. Bugger - where did I get that idea from then (have to admit, it's been a while since I paid a lot of attention to Ada!) >>...means that whether Y is a function or an >> array is irrelevant to the user as long as the result is valid. It is >> also related to the separation of interface from implementation. Write >> the implementation as an array to start with, e.g. for unit test >> purposes, then it can be replaced with a function without having to >> change the client who uses this interface. > >Right, that's the theory. But it only works for some functions, and >some arrays. Of course, but in principle.... Thanks Bob