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From: marc@hpfcdc.HP.COM ('Thelonious' Sabatella)
Newsgroups: comp.lang.misc
Subject: Re: What is B&D? (Re: Bondage and Discipline Languages)
Message-ID: <5160009@hpfcdc.HP.COM>
Date: 20 Jan 89 00:35:15 GMT
References: <2670@ficc.uu.net>
Organization: HP Ft. Collins, Co.
Lines: 24

/ hpfcdc:comp.lang.misc / rjh@cs.purdue.EDU (Bob Hathaway) /  6:34 pm  Jan 18, 1989 /
>>all programming languages are computationaly equivalent.  The question
>>is _how_ you do it.  Can you treat a variable as an integer at one
>>point then turn around and make it a pointer?  If your first reaction
>
>Yes, use variant records in Pascal and Modula-2 and unchecked_conversion
>in Ada.
>
>rjh@purdue.edu
----------

Fine.  Now tell me the address of a global variable in Pascal.  There may be
some bizarre construct that will get you this, but it is something that Wirth
clearly intended you not to do, and gave you no easy way to do it.  B&D is
relative, folks.  C and C++ don't let you write self-modifying code; ASM does.
ASM doesn't give you polymorphism, C++ does.  Pascal gives you neither, but
gives you true block structure.  There will always be some things you can do
in a language X you can't do in Y or Z, but things you can do in Y and/or Z
you can't do in X.

--------------
Marc Sabatella
HP Colorado Language Lab
marc%hpfcrt@hplabs.hp.com