My hardest-to-debug ever bug was because of this. Because FORTRAN is pass by reference, the compiler must do something special for the four in "SQRT(4.0)" -- and the PDP-10 (TOPS-10) FORTRAN compiler used a global literal table for this. I had a function that modified an argument, erroneously passed a literal number in, the compiler housed the number (may have been a 2) in the the gkobal table, and after that, all the "2" arguments in my program were invisibly changed.
I was 16 or 17, was an explorer scout at BTL, and was quick to embrace 6th edition UNIX and ed over TOPS-10 and TECO (ignoring the brilliantly named SOS, "son of stopgap") On Sun, Jan 6, 2019 at 12:15 PM Rob Pike <r...@golang.org> wrote: > Fortran depends heavily on pointers for its semantics: It is a call by > reference language. You just don't see them explicit in the language and > you have no control over whether an argument will be modified by a > procedure. > > -rob > > > On Mon, Jan 7, 2019 at 5:13 AM Victor Giordano <vitucho3...@gmail.com> > wrote: > >> i guess that a good question to start is there is a language that doesn't >> relays on pointer. Fortran as someone says below, may be a good example how >> things get done using values only. I programmed in COBOL in the universitiy >> and don't recall to use pointers. There aren't necessary at all, >> nevertheless they provide inderection or referrals that allow to express >> things more efficiently in certain scenarios. You could write an entire >> program witout using pointers,i guess, that call is in the cook chief!. >> Nice topic to talk. >> >> >> El martes, 1 de enero de 2019, 8:34:34 (UTC-3), 伊藤和也 escribió: >>> >>> What are the reasonable reasons to use pointers? Are pointers neseccary? >>> >> -- >> You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups >> "golang-nuts" group. >> To unsubscribe from this group and stop receiving emails from it, send an >> email to golang-nuts+unsubscr...@googlegroups.com. >> For more options, visit https://groups.google.com/d/optout. >> > -- > You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups > "golang-nuts" group. > To unsubscribe from this group and stop receiving emails from it, send an > email to golang-nuts+unsubscr...@googlegroups.com. > For more options, visit https://groups.google.com/d/optout. > -- *Michael T. jonesmichael.jo...@gmail.com <michael.jo...@gmail.com>* -- You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups "golang-nuts" group. To unsubscribe from this group and stop receiving emails from it, send an email to golang-nuts+unsubscr...@googlegroups.com. For more options, visit https://groups.google.com/d/optout.
