Path: utzoo!utgpu!news-server.csri.toronto.edu!cs.utexas.edu!convex!psmith
From: psmith@convex.com (Presley Smith)
Newsgroups: comp.lang.fortran
Subject: Re: F90 compiler from NAG
Message-ID: <1991Jun24.163115.13507@convex.com>
Date: 24 Jun 91 16:31:15 GMT
References: <1991Jun24.005145.865@convex.com> <28660D45.4578@ics.uci.edu>
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Organization: CONVEX Computer Corporation, Richardson, Tx., USA
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In article <28660D45.4578@ics.uci.edu> levine@liege.ics.uci.edu (David Levine) writes:
>Presley Smith writes:
>
>>There is a standard definition available from ANSI as to what is a
>>"compiler" and what is a "translator."   The best way to sort out
>>what to call the NAG product is for someone to find a copy of that
>>document and put those definitions on the net.
>
>Unfortunately, ANSI/IEEE Std 729-1983 (IEEE Standard Glossary of
>Software Engineering Terminology) doesn't help much:
>
>   compiler. A computer program used to compile.(ISO)  Contrast with
>   assembler, interpreter.
>
>   compile. To translate a higher order language program into its
>   relocatable or absolute machine code equivalent.  Contrast with
>   assemble, interpret.
>
>   translator. A program that transforms a sequence of statements
>   in one language into an equivalent sequence of statements in
>   another language.  See also assembler, compiler, interpreter.
>
>In general, I refer to a translator as a compiler if it does more than
>just textual substitution.  For example, modern compilers are based on
>an analysis/synthesis process.  It sounds to me like the NAG F90 product
>goes this route, and so I call it a compiler.


Seens to me to be a translator. 

  - Since a "compiler" is a "computer program used to compile"

  - AND the definition of "compile" is to "translate a higher order
    language program into it's relocatable or absolute machine code 
    equivalent"... 

 Since the NAG product produces C code as output, NOT relocatable or
 absolute machine code or equivalent... 

 Then by this standard set of definitions it's NOT a compiler...
 It has transformed one high order language (Fortran 90) into another
 high order language (C). 

If it produces C code as output, that would fit with the definition
of a translator.  It tranforms a sequence of statements in one language
(Fortran 90) into an equivalent sequence of statements in another 
language (C).  


If the NAG product is a compiler, then we need to change the standard
definitions.   In my mind, it's a translator.  

FYI. Presley  psmith@convex.com