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Date:      Wed, 15 Oct 1997 07:43:34 -0400 (EDT)
From:      Peter Dufault <dufault@hda.com>
To:        mike@smith.net.au (Mike Smith)
Cc:        hackers@FreeBSD.ORG
Subject:   Re: Call for Fortran assistance.
Message-ID:  <199710151143.HAA11297@hda.hda.com>
In-Reply-To: <199710150751.RAA02149@word.smith.net.au> from Mike Smith at "Oct 15, 97 05:21:46 pm"

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> Unfortunately, the customer is providing some of the software for the 
> system, and their language of preference is Fortran.  We've seen their 
> code before, and it's disgusting.  Unfortunately, they have the 
> algorithmic technology that we need, and they're not willing to 
> document it well enough for us to reimplement in another language.  
> (They have also stalled us up against a deadline, so we really don't 
>  have the time either.)

If they have a single input file / single output file (I assume
this is signal processing) how about hacking the run time to
intercept the reads and writes to those specific logical units?
You will probably find they have all their variables as globals in
unnamed COMMON and maybe you can get in before MAIN and put them
in shared memory and bypass the I/O, and the reads and writes are
just synchronization points for your process.

However, this is really stupid.  If they won't or can't agree to
putting CALL GETINPUT and CALL PUTRESULT into their code then you
should be really nervous.

BTW, struct used to do a decent job of cleaning up FORTRAN although
it turned it into ratfor.  There are also commercial products that
do the same thing but will turn it into more modern dialects.  The
last time I had to do something like this I wrote a parser to inhale
the mess and belch it out as tidied up F77.

Sometimes you will be pleasantly surprised at the underlying
invisible structure of some of this old legacy code.

Peter

-- 
Peter Dufault (dufault@hda.com)   Realtime development, Machine control,
HD Associates, Inc.               Safety critical systems, Agency approval



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