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From: mac@harris.cis.ksu.edu (Myron A. Calhoun)
Newsgroups: comp.lang.c,comp.lang.fortran
Subject: Re: Type punning in C
Keywords: I AGREE!
Message-ID: <4055@deimos.cis.ksu.edu>
Date: 12 Oct 89 13:10:38 GMT
References: <475@idacrd.UUCP> <1989Oct10.185851.6490@agate.berkeley.edu> <1989Oct11.091619.18336@gdt.bath.ac.uk> <1654@l.cc.purdue.edu>
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Reply-To: mac@harris.cis.ksu.edu (Myron A. Calhoun)
Followup-To: comp.lang.c
Organization: Kansas State University, Dept of Computing & Information Sciences
Lines: 30

In article <1654@l.cc.purdue.edu> cik@l.cc.purdue.edu (Herman Rubin) writes:
>In article <1989Oct11.091619.18336@gdt.bath.ac.uk>, exspes@gdr.bath.ac.uk (P E Smee) writes:
>> In article <1989Oct10.185851.6490@agate.berkeley.edu> jerry@violet.berkeley.edu ( Jerry Berkman ) writes:
>< >Why not use equivalence?

 [several lines deleted]

>> Problem is, the Fortran standard *also* says that if your program tries...

 [several lines deleted]

>This is another example of those "gurus" who can not envision an intelligent
>user using the machine in an intelligent manner, and prevent that use.  I
>have deliberately used "type punning" on various machines, and I consider it
>an extremely useful tool.....

 [several lines deleted]

I agree wholeheartedly.  FORTRAN doesn't have PL/1's UNSPEC verb, yet
I have had occasion to want it.  And EQUIVALENCE provided it.
Calling a subroutine with "wrong" type parameters can also work:
   CALL NEWTYP (INTEGER,...)
       :::::
   SUBROUTINE NEWTYP (REAL,...)
--Myron
--
Myron A. Calhoun, PhD EE, W0PBV, (913) 532-6350 (work), 539-4448 (home).
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