[fpc-pascal] some new features to delphi prisem

JoshyFun joshyfun at gmail.com
Sun Feb 21 23:07:00 CET 2010


Hello FPC-Pascal,

Sunday, February 21, 2010, 9:32:50 PM, you wrote:

DWN> This is actually valid ALGOL 60 and/or ALGOL 68.  Conditional
DWN> expressions were available in both languages.  I think Niklaus Wirth
DWN> continued with this in ALGOL W, but dropped it from Pascal.
DWN> Note that the ALGOLs required the "else" clause, as does C today (see
DWN> below).

I'm the opposite of an compilers expert, also never learned Algol,
modula, eiffel or non "main-stream" languages, except Forth. So I
known my opinion is not an expert opinion, just an opinion only.

After this preamble :) I must say that this is Pascal, not Algol ;)

>> Is it correct ? From my point of view is much more reasonable to use
>> something like:
>> z := iff(a=b,1,2);
DWN> This is over-punctuated Visual BASIC.  Yuck.

iff is valid in VB ? Just a coincidence, I was trying to note the
"if-function".

>> But to me it looks awful and a bit of c-ism and really horrible code
>> could be written:
>> z: Boolean;
>> begin
>> z := iff(a=b,iif(b=2,a=b,b<>a),not(a=b));
DWN> Mega-yuck!!

I even do not know the result :)

DWN> I can only infer that you don't write C.  The C equivalent is:

Oh yes, I write and wrote C/C++ that's the reason I hate such things,
like:

if (a=a++==a) {......}

It's a funny entertainment to try to know which exactly that condition
will execute.

DWN>    z = a == b ? 1 : 2;
DWN> It's terse, but one gets used to it.

In near 20 years I was unable to find the reason and need of such
constructions, even when my first computer only have 3 Kb for source
code.

-- 
Best regards,
 JoshyFun




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