Path: utzoo!attcan!utgpu!jarvis.csri.toronto.edu!mailrus!ncar!gatech!hubcap!billwolf%hazel.cs.clemson.edu
From: billwolf%hazel.cs.clemson.edu@hubcap.clemson.edu (William Thomas Wolfe, 2847 )
Newsgroups: comp.sw.components
Subject: Re: Garbage Collection & ADTs
Message-ID: <6593@hubcap.clemson.edu>
Date: 26 Sep 89 19:25:42 GMT
References: <393@e-street.Morgan.COM>
Sender: news@hubcap.clemson.edu
Reply-To: billwolf%hazel.cs.clemson.edu@hubcap.clemson.edu
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From amull@Morgan.COM (Andrew P. Mullhaupt):
> In this newsgroup, we find other programmers arguing that
> programmers should have no direct use for pointers, and so the language can
> determine the correct lifetime of dynamic data.

    Not exactly.  The argument is that pointers should only be 
    used by ADT implementors, not by application programmers.

> I suggest it is going to prove necessary for the languages which have
> this "Pascalian" point of view to close all loopholes (typecasts to 
> integer, etc.) to prevent the widespread use of C style perfidious 
> trickery to escape from sensible programming practice. (If you give 
> them an inch...)

    The real problem is not the elimination of mechanisms such as
    Ada's Unchecked_Conversion, but the maintenance of a software
    engineering perspective; bad code can be written in any language.


    Bill Wolfe, wtwolfe@hubcap.clemson.edu