Re: Confessions of an "OO Foreigner"

From: William M. Klein (wmklein_at_nospam.netcom.com)
Date: 12/30/03 

Date: Tue, 30 Dec 2003 04:53:05 GMT

Donald,
  When you can use that syntax is "medium" restricted. The following is from
the Standard:

"8.4.2.9 Object property
Object properties provide a special syntax to get information out of and pass
information back into an object. The mechanisms for accessing object properties
are get property methods and set property methods. A get property method is a
method explicitly defined with the GET PROPERTY phrase or a method implicitly
generated for a data item described with the PROPERTY clause; a set property
method is a method explicitly defined with the SET PROPERTY phrase or a method
implicitly generated for a data item described with the PROPERTY clause." 

-- 
Bill Klein
 wmklein <at> ix.netcom.com
"Donald Tees" <donald_tees@nospam.sympatico.ca> wrote in message
news:Y86Ib.4166$Vl6.1073088@news20.bellglobal.com...
> LX-i wrote:
> > (there is a reply down there somewhere....)
> >
> > William M. Klein wrote:
> >
> >>    INVOKE  specific-object-reference-data-item   specific-method-name
> >>                 USING  various-parameter-by-CONTENT/REFERENCE/VALUE
> >>                 RETURNING returned-value-data-item
> >>
> > ...
> >
> >>    INVOKE method-name UPON object-reference-name USING ...
> >>
> >> Well, I lost <G> that battle and we ended up with INVOKE
> >> object-reference.  Once
> >> we had "object-reference" as the object (grammatical usage) of the
> >> INVOKE verb,
> >> then I though we AT LEAST should have an OPTIONAL keyword explaining
> >> "what"
> >> (adverbial) we wanted to do with this "second" thing, the
> >> method-name.  What I
> >> wanted was something like
> >>
> >>   INVOKE object-reference <WITH>  method-name USING ....
> >>
> >> Well, I lost <G> that battle and we ended up with two "nouns"
> >> following the
> >> INVOKE verb - with two VERY different meanings and no preposition
> >> between them.
> >> As far as I know, this is the ONLY time this exists in COBOL (which is
> >> English
> >> like) and totally (IMHO) obscures what the INVOKE statement does!!!
> >
> >
> > I'm with you.  Other languages use something like
> >    return-value = object.method(parameters)
> >
> > I'm surprised they didn't say
> > INVOKE method-name OF object-name ...
> >
> > This utilizes a very familiar COBOL construct, which is used to uniquely
> > identify data items.
> >
> > Any of you savvier OO guys know of a reason that that wouldn't make more
> > sense?
> >
> >
>
> In reply to that latter, you can do exactly that by using the set
> property method to invoke a procedure.
>
> IE MOVE "action-required" TO INVOCATION-METHOD of object-name.
>
> Donald
>