Path: utzoo!attcan!utgpu!jarvis.csri.toronto.edu!clyde.concordia.ca!uunet!cs.utexas.edu!sun-barr!decwrl!shelby!portia!dhinds
From: dhinds@portia.Stanford.EDU (David Hinds)
Newsgroups: comp.lang.pascal
Subject: Re: TP bug???
Summary: The function call is definitely illegal
Message-ID: <7708@portia.Stanford.EDU>
Date: 15 Dec 89 21:09:29 GMT
References: <RON.89Dec13163843@clarity.Princeton.EDU> <2588590B.19990@paris.ics.uci.edu>
Sender: David Hinds <dhinds@Portia.stanford.edu>
Distribution: comp
Organization: Stanford University
Lines: 12

In article <2588590B.19990@paris.ics.uci.edu>, milne@ics.uci.edu (Alastair Milne) writes:
> ron@clarity.Princeton.EDU (Ronald Beekelaar) writes:
> >Const stringcolor: byte = color(blue, red);
> 			   ^^^^^ I believe this function call is illegal.

    The call is certainly illegal.  I think only simple expressions can be
evaluated in constant definitions, typed or otherwise.  I think they can
include compile-time internal functions (like sizeof, ord, hi, lo, ofs, seg),
but nothing else, so probably not even trig functions.  Since the value has
to be calculated at compile-time, it would be very tricky for the compiler to
use part of the program-being-compiled to evaluate it.  It isn't handling the
problem with much grace, though.