🚀 go-pugleaf

In article <92Nov15.195430est.47880@neat.cs.toronto.edu> tlai@cs.toronto.edu (Tony Wen Hsun Lai) writes:
>In article <BxrK6x.A04@mentor.cc.purdue.edu> hrubin@pop.stat.purdue.edu (Herman Rubin) writes:
>[stuff deleted]
>>I do not see how any system of references will enable writing

>>	*fill(*descriptor)

>>any faster.  Nor do I trust compiler writers (or government bureaucrats.)
>>And if the lack of pointers in the languages causes hardware to elide pointers
>>in favor of something clumsy like call_by_name, searching the name file, we
>>all lose.  I have also pointed out that I want to use this in cases in which
>>the calling routine does not even know the name.  True, you could read the
>>name, but is that any easier than reading the address?

>I guess you don't like pass by reference?  Pass by reference is almost
>inevitably implemented using pointers, but doesn't involve _explicit_
>pointers set up by the programmer.  You may not need or appreciate
>abstractions for your programming, but if you look at the evolution of
>language design, abstractions are important for designing and writing very
>large, maintainable programs.

What is my notation other than calling the function by an indirect reference,
and passing the argument similarly?  Now I can put the argument reference on
the stack by first reading it into a register and then putting that register
on the stack, but what is gained by that?  And if the machine does not have
a reasonable way to call a function by indirect reference, the only way that
it could be done is by placing the address in the code for the function call
at run time, and this, or any other, modification of code at run time is,
I believe, considered quite objectionable.  Fortran calls only by reference,
and has finally come around to realizing that indirect references (pointers)
can improve the situation.
-- 
Herman Rubin, Dept. of Statistics, Purdue Univ., West Lafayette IN47907-1399
Phone: (317)494-6054
hrubin@snap.stat.purdue.edu (Internet, bitnet)  
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