Path: utzoo!mnetor!uunet!seismo!sundc!pitstop!sun!plaid!chuq
From: chuq@plaid.Sun.COM (Chuq Von Rospach)
Newsgroups: comp.sys.mac
Subject: Re: Philosophical programming question:  handles
Message-ID: <41000@sun.uucp>
Date: 4 Feb 88 17:05:25 GMT
References: <870130@hpcilzb.HP.COM>
Sender: news@sun.uucp
Reply-To: chuq@sun.UUCP (Chuq Von Rospach)
Organization: Fictional Reality, uLtd
Lines: 28

>Did Apple invent the concept of "handles"? 

Nope. they've been around for a long time.

>Do other small computers (IBM PC, Atari, Amiga,
>etc.) use handles?

They can. The Mac was the first major machine that required.

>Do people ever use handles in a Unix environment?
>Most Unix programmers I talk to have never heard
>of a "handle"...

How about:

main(argc,argv)
	int argc;
	char **argv;

This is a pointer to an array of pointers to arrays of char. To do a
setenv, you basically re-arrange the array or pointers to the new
strings, but the handle (the char**) doesn't change.

chuq
Chuq Von Rospach			chuq@sun.COM		Delphi: CHUQ

                       What do you mean 'You don't really want to hurt her?'
                                    I'm a Super-Villain! That's my Schtick!