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From: "Warren W. Gay VE3WWG" <ve3wwg@NoSPAM.cogeco.ca>
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Subject: Re: variable length strings
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Date: Tue, 26 Oct 2004 12:11:11 -0400
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Date: 2004-10-26T12:11:11-04:00
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Larry Kilgallen wrote:
> In article <mailman.61.1098789536.10401.comp.lang.ada@ada-france.org>, Marius Amado Alves <amado.alves@netcabo.pt> writes:
> 
> 
>>This however perpetuates another problem: text files cannot be shared 
>>between different OSes.
> 
> 
> The problem of variable length record text files is beyond the reach
> of any Ada standard.
> 
> The possibilities VMS must handle are:
> 
> 	Out-of-band record termination (as codified in ISO-9660 6.10.4)
> 	CRLF record termination (compatible with Microsoft)
> 	CR record termination (compatible with MacOS)
> 	LF record termination (compatible with Unix)

Conceptually, someone/OS could also create:

         LFCR record termination

though I don't know of any in the wild.


> I do not think any non-proprietary standard supports all of those (in
> the sense of providing an out-of-band indicator regarding which is in
> use).

Agreed. I think it is reasonable that text files be in the correct
format for the platform in use. If they are not, then they require
conversion. I also accept that from a practical point of view, we
all like it to adapt anyway ;-)

Warren.