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Postings from February 2000
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On Thu, 10 Feb 2000 13:11:53 -0800 (PST), Tom Christiansen and Larry
Wall wrote:
>: You're mistaken. It was a decision made on precedent; see Ada.
>
>As was the decision to switch to :: instead; see C++. :-)
I've been puzzled for a long time about that piece of info from the
Perl docs. The single quote is used in Ada to represent "attributes",
which are kind of special and AFAIR cannot be defined by the
programmer. The link between a module and its contents is through the
dot character, so My_Package.Var or My_Package.Func(...) would refer
to what Perl calls $My_Package::Var or &My_Package::Func(), for
example. I have the feeling that $My_Package'Var would generate
confusion to a seasoned Ada programmer.
>Well, the fact is, octets *is* more precise, but I like bytes anyway
>because nowadays it's precise enough, and has come to mean exactly 8
>bits despite its tawdry etymological underpinnings
Not to a Common Lisp programmer. From the glossary of the Common Lisp
Hyperspec:
"byte n. 1. adjacent bits within an integer. (The specific number of
bits can vary from point to point in the program; see the function
byte.)
2. an integer in a specified range. (The specific range can vary from
point to point in the program; see the functions open and
write-byte.)"
A "byte" is any sequence of contiguous bits.
/L/e/k/t/u
(Common Lisp, Ada and Perl aficionado;
talk about "eclectic" :-)
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