Path: utzoo!utgpu!jarvis.csri.toronto.edu!cs.utexas.edu!uunet!mcsun!sunic!tut!hydra!kreeta!grano
From: grano@cs.Helsinki.FI (Kari Gran|)
Newsgroups: comp.lang.c
Subject: Re: C strongly typed?
Message-ID: <4401@hydra.Helsinki.FI>
Date: 9 Mar 90 00:30:18 GMT
References: <259@eiffel.UUCP> <1990Mar1.172526.28683@utzoo.uucp> <849@enea.se> <2963@goanna.oz.au>
Sender: news@cs.Helsinki.FI
Organization: University of Helsinki, Department of Computer Science
Lines: 30

In article <2963@goanna.oz.au> ok@goanna.oz.au (Richard O'keefe) writes:
!Try it in Ada (not checked, as I haven't access to an Ada compiler):
!	declare
!	    subtype apple  is integer;
!	    subtype orange is integer;
!	    a: apple;
!	    o: orange := 1;
!	begin
!	    a := o;
!	end
!Again, the assignment is well-typed.  Why should C be different?

	But you're using Ada's _subtypes_, which hide the fact that Ada is
a strictly (strongly? - not well defined terms anyway) typed language. If
you try

	declare
		type apple is integer;
		type orange is integer;
		a : apple;
		o : orange;
	begin a:= o; end;

then the types aren't any longer compatible and the assignment is thus
illegal.

Kari.
--
Kari Grano	grano@cs.helsinki.fi	Hey, my opinions are just mine..
	"I've got a thousand telephones that don't ring" - R.Z.