From owner-freebsd-current Tue Aug 27 19:45:30 2002 Delivered-To: freebsd-current@freebsd.org Received: from mx1.FreeBSD.org (mx1.FreeBSD.org [216.136.204.125]) by hub.freebsd.org (Postfix) with ESMTP id 0EE9537B400 for ; Tue, 27 Aug 2002 19:45:28 -0700 (PDT) Received: from HAL9000.homeunix.com (12-232-220-15.client.attbi.com [12.232.220.15]) by mx1.FreeBSD.org (Postfix) with ESMTP id 47E7743E3B for ; Tue, 27 Aug 2002 19:45:27 -0700 (PDT) (envelope-from dschultz@uclink.Berkeley.EDU) Received: from HAL9000.homeunix.com (localhost [127.0.0.1]) by HAL9000.homeunix.com (8.12.5/8.12.5) with ESMTP id g7S2k51v004752; Tue, 27 Aug 2002 19:46:05 -0700 (PDT) (envelope-from dschultz@uclink.Berkeley.EDU) Received: (from das@localhost) by HAL9000.homeunix.com (8.12.5/8.12.5/Submit) id g7S2k4Rg004751; Tue, 27 Aug 2002 19:46:04 -0700 (PDT) (envelope-from dschultz@uclink.Berkeley.EDU) Date: Tue, 27 Aug 2002 19:46:04 -0700 From: David Schultz To: Terry Lambert Cc: "Moore, Robert" , "'Mitsuru IWASAKI'" , yb@sainte-barbe.org, acpi-jp@jp.FreeBSD.org, current@FreeBSD.ORG, "Grover, Andrew" Subject: Re: [acpi-jp 1735] Re: Call for testers: acpica-unix-20020815 Message-ID: <20020828024604.GA4653@HAL9000.homeunix.com> Mail-Followup-To: Terry Lambert , "Moore, Robert" , 'Mitsuru IWASAKI' , yb@sainte-barbe.org, acpi-jp@jp.FreeBSD.org, current@FreeBSD.ORG, "Grover, Andrew" References: <3D6BF4E6.9B441A6B@mindspring.com> Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii Content-Disposition: inline In-Reply-To: <3D6BF4E6.9B441A6B@mindspring.com> Sender: owner-freebsd-current@FreeBSD.ORG Precedence: bulk List-ID: List-Archive: (Web Archive) List-Help: (List Instructions) List-Subscribe: List-Unsubscribe: X-Loop: FreeBSD.ORG Thus spake Terry Lambert : > FWIW, there's historical precedent for this: the DEC VAX/VMS > C compiler would imply semicolons for the programmer that > forgot them, and a couple of other similar "fixups", issue a > warning, but the resulting code would run "as the programmer > most likely intended", rather than not generating a running > program at all. > > The issue here is one of syntactical vs. grammatical ambiguity; > if the only choices are between two possible outcomes, and one > of them is a failure to operate at all, while the other is to > operate, but potentially incorrectly. The upshot is that ir > can't hurt, and it might help: > > assumption? > no yes > --------------------------------- > grammar error | FAILS | FAILS | > ------------------------------------------------| > syntax error | FAILS | WORKS | > ------------------------------------------------- > > So the worst possible outcome in the failure case is that it > fails -- which it already does, without the assumption -- and > the best possible outcome is that it succeeds when it wouldn't > have. > > "Anything that works is better than anything that doesn't" Sometimes. But see http://www.tuxedo.org/~esr/jargon/html/entry/DWIM.html To Unsubscribe: send mail to majordomo@FreeBSD.org with "unsubscribe freebsd-current" in the body of the message