On Sun, 11 Jan 2009 01:22:48 +0000, Rhodri James wrote: > On Sat, 10 Jan 2009 18:44:37 -0000, <ru...@yahoo.com> wrote: > >> What is the observable difference between converting an array to a >> reference (pointer) to that array and passing the reference by value, >> and passing the array by reference? > > This is a red herring, though. From either viewpoint, C arrays are > anomalous in comparison with other C data types.
I don't believe it is a red-herring. As I understand it, Mark and Joe insist that C is pass-by-value *even in the case of arrays*, despite the semantics of array passing being identical to the semantics of pass-by- reference in (say) Pascal. While Mark is willing to admit that arrays are "bizarre" (his term) in C, I don't think he accepts that passing arrays in C is anything but pass-by-value. I think this gets very close to the bone of the debate. It demonstrates that "pass-by-value" as Mark and Joe understand it is such a broad concept that it can describe any argument passing behaviour at all and therefore is meaningless. -- Steven -- http://mail.python.org/mailman/listinfo/python-list
