Re: So, what the heck is a continuation anyway?

["Seth Gordon" <address@hidden>]

Generally speaking, when you call a function, your program explicitly
says "evaluate this function with such-and-such arguments".  The
interpreter translates this to "evaluate this function with
such-and-such arguments, and return the value and the control of
further execution to *here*."

That "*here*" is the continuation.  If the programmer can get explicit
control of the continuation, then he or she can do perv^H^H^H^Hinteresting
things, since a function can return values to somewhere other than its
immediate caller.

_Lisp In Small Pieces_ has an excellent discussion of continuations,
and how they interact with other control structures, from an
implementor's point of view.

-- 
"If I don't know what I'm doing, I program in Scheme. If I don't want to be
allowed to not know what I'm doing (possibly for the sake of efficiency or
safety), I program in SML. If I want to get paid, I program in C++."
  --Thant Tessman
== Seth Gordon == sethg@ropine.com == http://ropine.com/ == std. disclaimer ==