Re: compiler directives; (was: Re: cheerful static typing (was: Any and Every... (was: Eval)))

["Krishnaswami, Neel" <address@hidden>]

Dorai Sitaram [mailto:ds26@gte.com] wrote:
> >    
> > Let me suggest (with a sly grin) that the distinction between
> > language construct and compiler directive is exactly as crisp
> > as the distinction between language and library.
> 
> Compiler directives (or "pragmas") are required to be
> flags.  So the distinction between them and lang
> construct may not be as smudgeable as the one
> between lang and lib. 

The library search path is often a compiler directive, and it's 
not a flag variable. 

And it's definitely smudgeable: in Python, for example, the search 
path can be specified on the command line. This then shows up at 
runtime as the variable sys.path, and modifying sys.path will change 
the search path for future module loads. 

-- 
Neel Krishnaswami
neelk@cswcasa.com