On Mon, Sep 15, 2003 at 10:33:27PM -0400, Bruce Feist wrote:
> if you stick to the natural meaning, that doesn't happen; integer and 
> other values have precise and obvious natural meanings.  NULL does not.

Integers and NULL are exactly alike it this regard. Neither has 
a natural meaning; their meanings are complete arbitrary. There's 
nothing about the symbol "6" that makes it the natural designation 
for "six". You wouldn't know that it stood for "six" unless you had 
been taught. What makes integers and NULL useful is that their 
meanings are conventional. The problem with a zero-length string is 
that it has no conventional meaning.

Bob Hall

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