What other languages use the same data model as Python?

Grant Edwards invalid at invalid.invalid
Thu May 5 12:48:58 EDT 2011


On 2011-05-05, Steven D'Aprano <steve+comp.lang.python at pearwood.info> wrote:
> On Thu, 05 May 2011 14:14:22 +0000, Grant Edwards wrote:
>
>> On 2011-05-05, harrismh777 <harrismh777 at charter.net> wrote:
>>> Grant Edwards wrote:
>>>> The "pass by value" and "pass by reference" parameter passing
>>>> mechanisms are pretty well defined, and C uses "pass by value".
>>>
>>> Yeah, that's kind-a funny, cause I'm one of the guys (old farts) that
>>> helped define them....
>> 
>> I give up.  You don't seem to understand the C language defintion or
>> what is commonly meant by "pass by reference".
>
>
> In fairness, he's not the only one. M Harris has twice now linked to an 
> IBM site that describes pass-by-reference in C in terms of passing a 
> pointer to the argument you want as the argument. Admittedly, doing so 
> gives you almost the same behaviour, except that you have to dereference 
> the pointers yourself.
>
> That's a pretty big difference though, and gets to the core of the 
> argument: it's a bit like arguing that manual cars are fitted with 
> exactly the same automatic transmission as auto cars, it's just that
> you have to engage the clutch and shift gears yourself.

I like that analogy.

   "My car has an automatic transmission except you have to shift
    gears yourself with that lever and that it has a clutch operated
    by that pedal instead of a hydrostatic torque converter."

-- 
Grant Edwards               grant.b.edwards        Yow! ... bleakness
                                  at               ... desolation ... plastic
                              gmail.com            forks ...



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