Path: utzoo!utgpu!news-server.csri.toronto.edu!mailrus!cs.utexas.edu!yale!cmcl2!lanl!lambda!jlg
From: jlg@lambda.UUCP (Jim Giles)
Newsgroups: comp.lang.misc
Subject: Re: Pointers as 3-tuples (Re: JLG's flogging of horses (was Re: Relationship between C and C++))
Message-ID: <14341@lambda.UUCP>
Date: 12 Apr 90 03:06:12 GMT
References: <8960015@hpfcso.HP.COM>
Lines: 20

From article <8960015@hpfcso.HP.COM>, by mjs@hpfcso.HP.COM (Marc Sabatella):
> [...]
> I must come from a different background than you do.  Where I come from,
> pointers are used for things like linked lists, binary trees, etc.

Where I come from, all those things are called recursive data structures.
These are _sometimes_ implemented using user-visable pointers (but only
if the language doesn't provide them directly).  If the language provides
recursive structures directly, even then, the implementation _may_ use
pointers internally (or it may not).  Pointers are related to recursive
data structures only in that pointers are _one_ of the possible implementation
strategies for them.

> Arrays can be used for this only if you know a priori the ultimate size of
> the data structure in question, or if your language allows dynamically
> reallocatable arrays.

The second choice is something I wholeheartedly support.

J. Giles