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From: franka@mmintl.UUCP (Frank Adams)
Newsgroups: net.lang
Subject: Re: Recursion
Message-ID: <624@mmintl.UUCP>
Date: Mon, 26-Aug-85 22:36:52 EDT
Article-I.D.: mmintl.624
Posted: Mon Aug 26 22:36:52 1985
Date-Received: Thu, 29-Aug-85 23:44:25 EDT
References: <909@oddjob.UUCP> <163@ho95e.UUCP> <367@ttrdc.UUCP> <1612@watdcsu.UUCP> <371@ttrdc.UUCP> <605@bu-cs.UUCP>
Reply-To: franka@mmintl.UUCP (Frank Adams)
Organization: Multimate International, E. Hartford, CT
Lines: 9
Summary: should have to be declared


Concerning the recent discussion of FORTRAN and recursion: I think recursive
routines should have to be declared as such, as in (gasp) PL/I.  Not because
of efficiencies gained by knowing when a routine is recursive, but as an aid
in writing correct code.  I believe that making an inadvertent recursive call
(which generally results in a semi-infinite loop) is a not-uncommon error,
and that it is unusual to make a correct recursive call without being aware
that that is what one is doing.

Of course, I also like PASCAL ...