Path: utzoo!utgpu!jarvis.csri.toronto.edu!mailrus!bbn!bbn.com!lpringle
From: lpringle@bbn.com (Lewis G. Pringle)
Newsgroups: comp.lang.c++
Subject: Re: stronger type checking of enums
Message-ID: <36748@bbn.COM>
Date: 3 Mar 89 19:19:15 GMT
References: <25740@cornell.UUCP>
Sender: news@bbn.COM
Reply-To: lpringle@labs-n.bbn.com (Lewis G. Pringle)
Organization: Bolt Beranek and Newman Inc., Cambridge MA
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In article <25740@cornell.UUCP> deb@cs.cornell.edu (David Baraff) writes:
>I'd like to make a case for stronger type checking of enum's.

I agree that this would be very nice. But it does introduce some
questions.  Array indexing.

One would probably also want to be able to declare:
	enum Color {r,g,b};
	int	a[Color];

Would you also add and Ord () function?

If you can do these things, then why not also allow subranges?  How
about integer subranges?  (Hmm... Begins to sould like Pascal?).

I like the suggestion, but you can see how one might get carried away
adding 'features' to the language.

						Lewis.




"OS/2: half an operating system for half a computer."

In Real Life:		Lewis Gordon Pringle Jr.
Electronic Mail:	lpringle@labs-n.bbn.com
Phone:			(617) 873-4433