Re: Pointers to "why C behaves like that ?"

On 24 Nov 2002 01:21:07 -0500, jacob navia wrote:
>> Requiring programmers to provide compilers with information that can
>> be statically inferred is an unfortunate waste of human resources.
>> Where types can be inferred statically, they can be annotated into the
>> source code via static analysis tools. Where types cannot be
>> statically inferred, the programmer ought to get a warning but the
>> execution can proceed on the basis of dynamic typing. Let the
>> programmer decide how he/she wishes to proceed.
>
>Yes, that can be maybe in principle be done but with an associated enormous
>cost in compiler complexity and problems.


    While, I completely agree with you, I must admit that we're already
    deviating from the separate compilation model into the realms of
    repositories and smart linkers.


    Nowadays, linkers have taken an awful lot of responsibilities from
    compilers. In effect linkers are presented with a complete picture
    of the software project and they're supposed to do stuff like IPO
    and COMDAT, which in my opinion can hardly qualify as a
    staged compilation model.


    Why they are doing that ? Well, because of the pressure from modern
    languages: templates from C++, extern inlines in C, things like that
    are not very well blended with the old compilation model.


    Thus, the argument of compiler having information about one source file
    at a time, is not a practical one.


Thanks,
Roman.

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