anything like C++ references?

[Stephen Horne]

On 13 Jul 2003 15:05:38 -0500, Ian Bicking <ianb at colorstudy.com>
wrote:

>On Sun, 2003-07-13 at 14:39, Stephen Horne wrote:
>> The fact is that 'assignment' has a common meaning separate from the
>> choice of programming language, 
>
>This just isn't true.  The C++ assignment operator is not at all like
>the Python assignment statement.  Python variables are not like C++
>variables, no surprise assignment is different too.  If you used
>languages outside of C++ and its like (e.g., Pascal), you would find
>Python's behavior common.

Think again.

When I say "'assignment' has a common meaning separate from the choice
of programming language" I assumed you would get the hint. I'm not
referring to some specific other programming language, of which I have
used many - and not all of them imperative. I am referring to the
definitions in computer theory, which do not relate to any specific
programming language but actually apply to all of them, irrespective
of paradigm and everything else.

Of course, if you really believe that pointer/reference behaviour
should be arbitrarily tied to mutability then you can claim that I am
wrong, but you still can't claim the high ground as this is still an
arbitrary and bizarre thing to do. The ability to change part or all
of a value in-place has nothing to do with whether that value is
referenced using a pointer or whatever in computer theory - any link
between pointers/references and mutability should be related to the
implementation of the language - not the semantics.

So much for dropping out of the discussion, but I hate it when people
make false claims about my beliefs, making me out to be ignorant, when
it is *not* *me* who is missing the point.