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From: bgr@long-grain.Rice.EDU (Robert G. Rhode)
Newsgroups: comp.sys.transputer
Subject: Re: choosing parallel languages
Message-ID: <409@brazos.Rice.edu>
Date: 2 Aug 89 21:44:48 GMT
References: <275@oscsuna.osc.edu> <8908011650.AA12679@kanga.cs.umass.edu.edu> <5726@pt.cs.cmu.edu>
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> >The only thing I would change is to allow value functions
> >to be recursive and specify that tail recursion is properly
> >dealt with (as in Scheme.)
> I agree with this.  Recursion is a very useful thing, and I'm not
> the type to manage my own stacks of stuff (I'm generally too lazy or
> stupid for this).  Unfortunately, inserting recursion into the occam
> langauge would require the incorporation of dynamic memory allocation.
> You need it to build call stack frames and the like.

I believe (and I'm sure I will be corrected if I am wrong :-) ) Scheme handles
tail recursion by re-using the existing stack frame, thus not using any more
memory than a single function call.  I think I saw this in Dybvig's book. 

Robert Rhode			|	"Today's champion
rhode@ricevm1.rice.edu		|    is tomorrow's crocodile shit."
bgr@uncle-bens.rice.edu		| Monty Python : Contractual Obligation Album