Re: Parameter prototype question

Hi, Barbara:

I appreciate your reply, and it makes perfect sense.

I am more concerned with checking the type, length and decimal places for "compatibility" across CALLs -- in other words, checking each parameter for the correct type of argument. Especially across separately compiled units (modules).

The compiler and/or runtime should provide for type checking of parameters / arguments for external procedures at bind-time, (for bind-by-copy or bind-by-reference), and compatibility checking at runtime for late-bound calls, to help ensure "type safety."

These ideas are well-known and documented in the literature, and their value has been proven in languages like Modula-2 since the 1980s.

Thanks,

Mark S. Waterbury

> On 5/17/2010 3:46 PM, Barbara Morris wrote:

On 5/14/2010 9:35 PM, Mark S. Waterbury wrote:

Given this whole set of problematic scenarios, would it perhaps not be
an improvement to have perhaps a new option on the compile commands to
allow the RPG IV compiler to at least flag these situations with a
WARNING message? Then, at least the programmer could look at those
warnings and perhaps take preventive / corrective action accordingly.

Mark, that question has come up before. The compiler isn't smart enough
to know that it shouldn't flag this type of statement
x = x + 1

The thinking was that there would just be way too many warning messages
to cope with.