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,FREEMAIL_FROM autolearn=ham autolearn_force=no version=3.4.4 X-Google-Language: ENGLISH,ASCII-7-bit X-Google-Thread: 103376,a00006d3c4735d70 X-Google-Attributes: gid103376,public X-Google-ArrivalTime: 2004-01-08 19:59:24 PST Path: archiver1.google.com!news2.google.com!news.maxwell.syr.edu!newsfeed.icl.net!newsfeed.fjserv.net!colt.net!peernews3.colt.net!newsfeed.stueberl.de!small1.nntp.aus1.giganews.com!nntp.giganews.com!cyclone1.gnilink.net!spamkiller2.gnilink.net!nwrdny02.gnilink.net.POSTED!0e8a908a!not-for-mail From: Hyman Rosen User-Agent: Mozilla/5.0 (Windows; U; Windows NT 5.1; en-US; rv:1.6b) Gecko/20031205 Thunderbird/0.4 X-Accept-Language: en-us, en MIME-Version: 1.0 Newsgroups: comp.lang.ada Subject: Re: Certified C compilers for safety-critical embedded systems References: <4r4qvvoo21a01nderfn4us3iv468vqas0m@4ax.com> In-Reply-To: Content-Type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii; format=flowed Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit Message-ID: Date: Fri, 09 Jan 2004 03:59:23 GMT NNTP-Posting-Host: 162.84.192.162 X-Complaints-To: abuse@verizon.net X-Trace: nwrdny02.gnilink.net 1073620763 162.84.192.162 (Thu, 08 Jan 2004 22:59:23 EST) NNTP-Posting-Date: Thu, 08 Jan 2004 22:59:23 EST Xref: archiver1.google.com comp.lang.ada:4240 Date: 2004-01-09T03:59:23+00:00 List-Id: Alexandre E. Kopilovitch wrote: > No. I'm against over-emphasising of "purity" for functions on the basis of > analogy with functions in mathematics. This is the worst mistake in computing that is made by people who are really smart. They get so caught up on their analogies and metaphors that they forget that programming is not the analogous object. It is its own very unique form of expression, and treating it as if it were exactly something else leads to error and inconvenience. You see the same sort of thing in object-oriented programming debates, not just in Ada with respect to functions with in/out parameters. The way Eiffel was ruined by covariance is another example.