🚀 go-pugleaf

In article <00964E42.F315D220.13757@esseX.stfx.ca> andrea@ESSEX.STFX.CA (John Andrea) writes:

   TYPE
      data :ADDRESS;
      left, right :Pointer;

   Unfortunately that approach removes type checking and you can put the wrong
   data type into your tree.

Not if you create a separate module where the parameters have the
correct type and must be coerced to the above.  Granted you could get
this wrong, but if you do it once, you can use it as a template and
then just use search/replace to create a new module with the correct
type.  If the compiler is any good, it should be able to inline all
the interface procedures and so it doesn't cost you anything at
runtime.


   Yes it looks like the OO approach wins in a situation like this.

The one OO solution I've seen to this is not one I'd advocate and not
one I think comp.object readers would like either.  The classic (and
IMHO still the best) solution to this problem is parametric
polymorphism aka ``generics'' in Ada or ``templates'' in C++ (the
above solution is just a manual instantiation method).  This has
_nothing_ to do with OO.

yours against gratuitous use of OO as a panacea,

bevan