[Cst-1b] Comp.Prog.Lang - ALGOL - Trouble Spots 2

[Nathan Dimmock]

Martin Harper wrote:
> 
> On page 16 of comp.prog.lang(5.8), one of the trouble spots of ALGOL is
> claimed to be -
> "The types and modes of calling procedure arguments could not be specified."
> 
> however, looking at the code fragments, it seems that you can - for example,
> over the page there is a "transpose" procedure, which runs as -
> 
> real procedure transpose(A, m)
>     value m;
>     real array A; integer m;
> begin
>     ...
> end
> 
> this clearly implies to me that the mode of calling is that m is by val, A by
> name, and that m is an integer, while A is a real array.... what have I
> forgotten/misunderstood? :(

Nothing, as far as I can see!  This does seem to be a contradiction in
the notes and as no one else on this list seems to be able to provide an
answer either, perhaps you should e-mail MR and ask him what he meant. 
If you get an answer, could you share it with the rest of the list
please?

-- 
Nathan 
Jesus College, Cambridge, CB5 8BL
http://www-jcsu.jesus.cam.ac.uk/~ned21/