Official definition of call-by-value (Re: Finding the instance reference...)

[greg]

Antoon Pardon wrote:
> Call by value is officially defined in terms of assignment in
> a context where assignments means copying and in a definition
> of a specifix language.
> 
> You can't lift this part out of the definition of algol 60
> and say it applies equally well in languages with different
> assignment semantics.

But many other language designers, of both static and
dynamic languages, have done just that.

I'm not saying it *has* to be interpreted that way,
just that it *is* very often interpreted that way.
So you can't claim that it's not common usage.

> If call by value is defined in terms of assignment regardless
> of what the semantics of the assignment is then IMO call by
> value is rather useless term

Not at all. It very concisely conveys how parameters
are passed, once you know how assignment works -- and
you need to understand that in any case.

-- 
Greg