🚀 go-pugleaf

Benedict Rafanello (bmr@buoy.cis.ufl.edu) wrote:
: |> >>>  e) DEFINITION & IMPLEMENTATION merged.
: 
: |>  >>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.  Even if you accept that merging the def and imp is good,
: |>  >>interface details like READONLY really deserve their own keywords.
: 
: |>  No, this is a good move.  The maintenance of only 1 file is a big
: |>  win.  If you are concerned about the definition being published with
: |>  the source, don't worry.  There is a `Browser' module which will
: |>  output a definition for a compiled module.  You can then ship the
: |>  defintion (sans comments, unless you provide them) with your object
: |>  modules.
: 
: If both the interface and the implementation are in one file, how do you
: tell when only the implementation was changed?  This is very important for
: large projects.  Some of the projects that I have been involved with contain
: more than a million lines of code.  These projects (done in Ada) would take
: several DAYS just to compile.  If the interface to a package was changed,
: we would have to go through that horrendous compile cycle whereas if just
: the implementation was changed, we only needed to relink.  How does Oberon
: handle this?
: 
: Ben

There is a compiler option, which tells to the compiler that interface 
may change. If you compile a source file without that option you cannot 
change the interface (create a new .sym file) without a compile time error.
So there is no need to recompile the other stuff (and as you know there is
no linking phase in Oberon :-), after changes that do not affect interface.

In short in Oberon it is the compiler which creates the interface file.
-- 
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| University of Joensuu                 |   When I was younger I always thought|
| jpussi@cs.joensuu.fi                  |   but nowadays I don't.              |
| or something like that                |                                      |