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From: Kai_Henningsen@ms.maus.de (Kai Henningsen)
Newsgroups: comp.lang.eiffel
Subject: Re: Reference Semantics
Message-ID: <17728@ms.maus.de>
Date: 18 Jun 91 01:16:00 GMT
Distribution: world,comp
Organization: Maus Mailbox Netz - UUCP-Gateway Bremen
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Markku Sakkinen sakkinen%jyu.fi @ SUB schrieb am Mi 12.06.1991, 07:25

MS>Analogies and parables are often useful, but often also dangerous:
MS>keep in mind that they can only suggest something, never prove it.
MS>I think that the need to share some objects is much more fundamental
MS>for object modelling than is the need to jump for imperative programming.

I don't think so. Jumping around IS fundamental for imperative programming.
What is NOT fundamental is using the GOTO construct to do it, and nowadays we
prefer all sorts of FOR, WHILE, IF, CASE and whatever constructions to do just
the same jumping around, albeit in a much more controlled fashion.

The same might be true for reference semantics: while the raw form is
dangerous, there might be more controlled forms that are not. We might already
know about some, and not about others; but I think that idea is worth pursuing.
So, the question is: what do we *really* want to accomplish with reference
semantics? Could we devise one or more models with not-as-general semantics
that do exactly that in a controlled form? Think of GOTO vs. FOR, WHILE,
IF-THEN-ELSE.
--
Kai Henningsen  Internet: kh@ms.maus.de
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