RE: RPGIII compiler vs Visual Basic

Steve, this is a good point.  I have to think about it a little more,
but as you have explained it, static methods may well be a good
compromise between procedural and class-based languages.  And once you
have the syntax, then you just need to add a variable type of "object"
to each procedural language, and an interface to garbage collection, and
you can move into OO pretty seamlessly.

Interesting...

Joe

> From: Steve Richter
> 
> I had the same reaction.  "static" methods are the equivalent of
> standalone procedures.  The .NET Convert class is a good example of a
> static class.
> http://msdn.microsoft.com/library/en-
> us/cpref/html/frlrfSystemConvertClassTopic.asp?frame=true
> 
> To convert a string to an integer:
>    int PortNx ;
>   string PortNumber = "23" ;
>  PortNx = System.Convert.ToInt32( PortNumber ) ;
> 
> this static method converts a base64 encoded string to an array of
bytes:
>   byte[] results = System.Convert.FromBase64String( ResponseData ) ;
> 
> The DateTime class has a bunch of good static methods:
>   DateTime  beginRun = DateTime.Now ;   // the current timestamp
>   DateTime endRun = DateTime.UtcNow ; // the current UTC timestamp.
> 
> The advantage of static class methods over standalone procedures is
> you can make your statics either public or private.   You organize the
> statics in a class ( really a namespace ).  Users of your class only
> see the public methods. To structure your code you have a bunch of
> private static methods that do a lot of the work, only users of the
> class dont have to see those methods.
> 
> -Steve