Path: csiph.com!fu-berlin.de!uni-berlin.de!individual.net!not-for-mail From: Bob Eager Newsgroups: alt.folklore.computers,comp.sys.raspberry-pi Subject: Re: Is it a lost cause? Date: 3 Jul 2016 13:02:25 GMT Lines: 32 Message-ID: References: <20160613210220.7d9874b5@maxa-pc.cpe.bvcom.net> <440983857.489168038.520479.peter_flass-yahoo.com@news.eternal-september.org> <20160703135320.2c5ca53588ec29548c3dd06a@eircom.net> Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset=UTF-8 Content-Transfer-Encoding: 8bit X-Trace: individual.net Q6WPocK0HrPS73SIO/Rifg47R7ekOv3eLOnkympIcLIbjzR63E Cancel-Lock: sha1:aOZ6x/ocoQx+5U0WgJznjnZzTrc= User-Agent: Pan/0.139 (Sexual Chocolate; GIT bf56508 git://git.gnome.org/pan2) Xref: csiph.com alt.folklore.computers:166393 comp.sys.raspberry-pi:12336 On Sun, 03 Jul 2016 13:53:20 +0100, Ahem A Rivet's Shot wrote: > On 3 Jul 2016 11:39:20 GMT Bob Eager wrote: > >> To declare an array, you generally used a library function ('newvec' I >> think) that was like malloc in C (and on which malloc was based), thus >> getting the address of some memory you could treat as an array. > > The size of an array was held in the cell[1] preceding the array > (ie A!-1), That was a mere convention, and not widely observed. Not part of the language. > there were also library functions for packing and unpacking > strings of characters into arrays of cells. Of course. > 1: They were called words when I learned BCPL. Yes, the term 'cell' came later on when 'words' were not a term used on most target systems. -- Using UNIX since v6 (1975)... Use the BIG mirror service in the UK: http://www.mirrorservice.org