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From: jos@cs.vu.nl
Newsgroups: comp.lang.eiffel
Subject: Misleading obsolete feature in std_files
Message-ID: <4538@vlot.cs.vu.nl>
Date: 14 Nov 89 17:42:43 GMT
Sender: jos@cs.vu.nl
Reply-To: jos@cs.vu.nl ()
Organization: VU Informatica, Amsterdam
Lines: 29

During the change from 2.1b to 2.2, I encountered a misleading message:

When using the routine `readstring' from library class FILE I get
the following message from the compiler:

      readstring obsolete, use `readline'

This is incorrect, because the routine `readline' has completely
different semantics.

Looking further, I found out that the class texts in library/2.1 are NOT
the same as in the 2.1 version we had (2.1b). This leaves me with three
versions of routine `readline'.
It seems that there are two semantically different versions of `readstring'.

Version 2.1b        : class FILE                  : readline reads specified
						    number of characters.
Version 2.2 level A : class library/2.1/file.e    : readline reads one line.
Version 2.2 level A : class library/kernel/file.e : readline reads one line.

This is VERY confusing and potentially dangerous.

The versions:       Version 2.1b       , SUN3
		    Version 2.2 level A, SUN4/sparc


			     Jos Warmer
			     jos@cs.vu.nl
			     ...uunet!mcvax!cs.vu.nl!jos