What is Expressiveness in a Computer Language

Darren New dnew at san.rr.com
Thu Jun 22 12:02:34 EDT 2006


rossberg at ps.uni-sb.de wrote:
> Are you sure that you aren't confusing *abstract* with *algebraic* data
> types? 

I've never heard of algebraic data types. It's always been "abstract 
data types". Perhaps I stopped studying it, and the terminology changed 
when many people started to consider encapsulation as abstraction. I 
have any number of old textbooks and journals that refer to these as 
"abstract data types", including texts that show an abstract data type 
and then explain how to program it as an encapsulated object class.

> No, the following compiles perfectly fine (using GNU Pascal):

That'll teach me to rely on 15-year-old memories. :-) Maybe I'm 
remembering the wishful thinking from when I used Pascal.

-- 
   Darren New / San Diego, CA, USA (PST)
     My Bath Fu is strong, as I have
     studied under the Showerin' Monks.



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