Path: utzoo!attcan!uunet!lll-winken!lll-tis!ames!husc6!cs.utexas.edu!sdcrdcf!ism780c!darryl
From: darryl@ism780c.isc.com (Darryl Richman)
Newsgroups: comp.lang.modula2
Subject: Re: CONVERT, and the meaning of "meaning"
Message-ID: <11928@ism780c.isc.com>
Date: 14 Jul 88 14:35:32 GMT
References: <3650@pdn.UUCP> <8807071341.AA09718@banzai-inst.sw.mcc.com> <507@ethz.UUCP>
Reply-To: darryl@ism780c.UUCP (Darryl Richman)
Organization: Interactive Systems Corp., Santa Monica CA
Lines: 22

In article <8807071341.AA09718@banzai-inst.sw.mcc.com> Info-Modula2 Distribution List  writes:
>I hope we're not going the way of C which thinks it's acceptable to give "an
>exception" (core dump) every time some poor programmer passes NULL to
>strlen()!

I only wish most C implementations did do this!  Passing NULL to strlen()
is WRONG.  It DESERVES a core dump.  But brain damaged BSD code (amongst
other brain damaged code) does it all the time.  This is not so wonderful when
it needs to run on brain damaged machines such as the 286!  And AT&T seems
to have picked up the habit now as well!

	...

I'm sorry.  I know this is the Modula 2 forum and that it has a commendably
high signal to noise ratio, which I'm hurting with this posting, but I
have spent 3.5 years explaining this and it just punched my button.

		--Darryl Richman
-- 
Copyright (c) 1988 Darryl Richman. The views expressed are the author's alone.
	  INTERACTIVE Systems Corporation -- An Eastman Kodak Company
   ...!{kodak | cca!ima | sdcrdcf}!ism780c!darryl or darryl@ism780c.isc.com
"For every problem, there is a solution that is simple, elegant, and wrong." -- H. L. Mencken