From rotthaeuser@gmd.de Thu Apr 4 14:49:46 1996 Received: from mail.gmd.de (mail.gmd.de [129.26.8.90]) by dkuug.dk (8.6.12/8.6.12) with SMTP id OAA15447 for ; Thu, 4 Apr 1996 14:49:08 +0200 From: rotthaeuser@gmd.de Received: from [129.26.9.43] (mac-rotth) by mail.gmd.de with SMTP id AA03969 (5.67b8/IDA-1.5 for ); Thu, 4 Apr 1996 14:48:47 +0200 Message-Id: <199604041248.AA03969@mail.gmd.de> Date: Thu, 4 Apr 1996 13:54:30 +0100 To: mn@sd214.zfe.siemens.de X-Sender: rotth@gmdzi.gmd.de Subject: (SC22WG5.1058) Default Data Type - 2 Different Definitions? Cc: sc22wg5@dkuug.dk > we may have a problem with the term "default". In using the concept of > "default" kind of data type, we MAY actually be using two differing and > incompatible definitions. > 1. The "default" kind for a data type is the kind of the data type which > is the most frequent and suitable for the application which the programmer > is writing. > > 2. The "default" kind for a data type is the kind of data type which is > most natural for the hardware architecture which the Fortran compiler is > compiling source code for. > we should clearly define both usages of the concept of default kind and > rigorously distinguish which one we are using in any given situation. We are using neither one. The default kind is the one that the compiler uses when some other kind is not specified. It has little to do with what is most natural and suitable for anything. (Of course, it seems likely that a vendor would strive to make it both suitable for applications and natural for the architecture, but neither of these has much obvious to do with the standard). -- Richard Maine maine@altair.dfrc.nasa.gov