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From: peters@cubsvax.UUCP (Peter S. Shenkin)
Newsgroups: net.lang.c
Subject: Re: C vs. FORTRAN (was: What should be added to C)
Message-ID: <478@cubsvax.UUCP>
Date: Thu, 29-May-86 16:49:56 EDT
Article-I.D.: cubsvax.478
Posted: Thu May 29 16:49:56 1986
Date-Received: Sat, 31-May-86 06:44:13 EDT
References: <1594@ecsvax.UUCP> <853@bentley.UUCP> <ecsvax.1621>
Reply-To: peters@cubsvax.UUCP (Peter S. Shenkin)
Organization: Columbia Univ. Bio. CG Fac., NY
Lines: 26

In article <ecsvax.1621> dgary@ecsvax.UUCP (D Gary Grady) writes:
>In article <853@bentley.UUCP> kwh@bentley.UUCP (KW Heuer) writes:
>>In article <1594@ecsvax.UUCP> ecsvax!dgary (D Gary Grady) writes:
>>>o A richer set of floating point operators, including exponentiation and
>>>  the so-called "in-line" functions (many of which ARE in C).
>>
>>I think you mean "builtin" rather than "inline".  I don't even consider that
>>a significant difference, much less an advantage of FORTRAN.
>
>No, I meant "inline."  That's a standard FORTRAN term and I'm surprised
>you're not familiar with it.  Anyway, the in-line functions in FORTRAN
>include absolute value, imaginary part (of a complex number), real part
>(ditto), complex conjugate, explicit truncation, explicit rounding, mod,
>sign, positive difference, type conversion, maximum, minimum, and... 

All my FORTRAN books call these *intrinsic* functions.  This is equivalent
in meaning to "built-in."  An "in-line" function sounds more like what would
be meant by FORTRAN's *statement* function, which acts, from the point of
view of the programmer, more-or-less the same way as a a C macro definition.

To those who are about to point out ever-so-kindly that this discussion no 
longer belongs in net.lang.c, I agree, and, now that I've put in my 2-cents' 
worth, I suggest that we either all shut up, or move it to net.lang.f77.

Peter S. Shenkin	 Columbia Univ. Biology Dept., NY, NY  10027
{philabs,rna}!cubsvax!peters		cubsvax!peters@columbia.ARPA