Re: looping through variable length array

[Stephen Leake <stephen.a.leake.1@gsfc.nasa.gov>]

"Stephen Frackelton" <stephen.frackelton@baesystems.com> writes:

> i'm attempting to loop through a set of arrays, but theses arrays are of
> different lengths to cater for various message sizes.
> but i want to write the loop only once to cater for this.
> how is the best way to model this ?

Attributes! 

procedure Loop_Thru_Array (Item : in Some_Array_Type) 
is begin
   for I in Item'range loop
      ...
   end loop;
end Loop_Thru_Array;

> can i somehow use an unconstrained array ?

Yes. To make different sized array objects all of the same type, you
use an unconstrained array type.

type Some_Array_Type is array (Some_Index_Type range <> ) of Whatever_Type;

> if i have my data available in a fixed size array, how can i get
> this variable into a format i can loop through, regardless of the
> size of the array.

Use a slice.

Fixed_Data : Some_Array_Type (1 .. 100);
Fixed_Data_Last : Some_Index_Type := 50;

-- Suppose only 1 .. Fixed_Data_Last has real data

Loop_Thru_Array (Fixed_Data (1 .. Fixed_Data_Last));

Hope this helps.

-- 
-- Stephe