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From: johnl@ima.istc.sri.com
Newsgroups: comp.compilers
Subject: Re: What makes a language popular?
Message-ID: <638@ima.ISC.COM>
Date: Mon, 3-Aug-87 13:49:04 EDT
Article-I.D.: ima.638
Posted: Mon Aug  3 13:49:04 1987
Date-Received: Thu, 6-Aug-87 04:12:44 EDT
References: <331@hubcap.UUCP> <627@ima.ISC.COM>
Sender: johnl@ima.ISC.COM
Reply-To: harvard!rutgers!petsd!cjh
Organization: Concurrent Computer Corporation, Tinton Falls, N.J.
Lines: 38
Approved: compilers@ima.UUCP
In-Reply-To: <632@ima.ISC.COM>


In article <632@ima.ISC.COM> this comment appeared:
>Pascal:  The universally recognized standard reference is Jensen and Wirth.

Since 1981, there has been an ANSI standard for Pascal which cleans
up the definition that one can glean from J&W.  In particular, it
repairs the perfunctory job that was done on passing procedure &
function names to other procedures & functions, and resolves several
ambiguities in J&W.

There is also an ISO standard, which is similart to the ANSI standard
but goes beyond it in one direction: "conformant arrays," which allow
the programmer to write a subprogram what will take arrays of a given
element type and varying size.  This is a valuable feature, already
present in FORTRAN and other languages.

At least one company (Concurrent Computer Corporation) supports a
Pascal compiler that conforms to the ISO standard.  

ANSI = American National Standards Institute. (USA only.)
ISO = International Standards Organization. (World-wide, but still
confined to Planet Earth.)
"universally recognized" presumably refers to the much larger part of
existence that is beyond our atmosphere.

Regards,
Chris
--
Full-Name:  Christopher J. Henrich
UUCP:       ...!hjuxa!petsd!cjh
US Mail:    MS 313; Concurrent Computer Corporation;
            106 Apple St; Tinton Falls, NJ 07724
Phone:      (201) 758-7288
Concurrent Computer Corporation is a Perkin-Elmer company.
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