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From: "Jeffrey R. Carter" <spam.jrcarter.not@spam.not.acm.org>
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Subject: Re: Forth and others (Was Re: How to get Ada to ?cross the chasm??)
Date: Sun, 13 May 2018 10:06:00 +0200
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Xref: reader02.eternal-september.org comp.lang.ada:52333
Date: 2018-05-13T10:06:00+02:00
List-Id: <comp.lang.ada>

On 05/12/2018 11:27 PM, Niklas Holsti wrote:
> 
> The HP-BASIC in use allowed variable identifiers of the form: one letter A-Z 
> followed by one optional decimal digit.

My 1st PC was an Acorn Atom. Its BASIC was quite fast, mainly because it only 
had 26 16-bit integer variables, named A-Z. An array or string used up one of 
those variables and stored the address of the 1st element in the variable. 
(There was also a variable named @, but it was used to control formatting of 
output, so you only used it in emergencies.)

If you had the optional floating-point ROM, you also got an additional 26 
floating-point variables, named (IIRC) %A-%Z.

-- 
Jeff Carter
"C's solution to this [variable-sized array parameters] has real
problems, and people who are complaining about safety definitely
have a point."
Dennis Ritchie
25