🚀 go-pugleaf

In article <5897@balrog.ctron.com> smith@ctron.com (Lawrence C Smith) writes:

   [ much that I agree with ]

   >      e) DEFINITION & IMPLEMENTATION merged.  Exported identifiers are
   >      marked with a *.  Read-only exported variables are marked with a -.
   >      Let us hope they make a read-only VAR parameter, which would be
   >      useful for exported procedures that take a VAR parm for efficiency.
   >      The programmer using the procedure would be guaranteed that the
   >      parameter is not modified!

   This was a really bad move.  Now you can't define the interface separately
   and enforce it, and the "*" and "-" stuff is really kludgy, very atypical
   of Wirth's work.

You could, of course, argue that the def/imp model is a "bad move"
because it forces one interface on a piece of code.  There is nothing
stopping me using an implementation for more than one purpose (e.g. an
avl tree to implement a set or a map) by having two interfaces to it
(a la signatures/structures in ML).  Personally I'm ambivalent.

   Just about the best language money can buy, though. All it needs is a good
   exception-handling mechanism to be ready to take on all comers.

Hm, seems to be a bit of deja vu here :-)  Did you see/reply to my
last set of questions about your view of exception handling.  I didn't
see any folloup.

bevan