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From: wmb@MITCH.ENG.SUN.COM
Newsgroups: comp.lang.forth
Subject: Re: Blocks vs Text files
Message-ID: <9011022144.AA24083@ucbvax.Berkeley.EDU>
Date: 2 Nov 90 19:09:14 GMT
Sender: daemon@ucbvax.BERKELEY.EDU
Reply-To: wmb%MITCH.ENG.SUN.COM@SCFVM.GSFC.NASA.GOV
Organization: The Internet
Lines: 14

>  Can't I just think that a block is a big line? I see no difference.

In some sense, yes.  However, there are a few differences:

1) "\" only ignores a portion of that "big line".

2) A text file implies a particular sequence of lines, with a well-defined
   end-of-file.  The "sequencing" of "block lines" is handled differently,
   either with THRU or with "-->".  If you try to write a program that
   "reads ahead" in its own input stream, you will encounter annoying
   "what to do at the end of the line" differences between the block line
   model and the text file line model.

Mitch Bradley, wmb@Eng.Sun.COM