Let DEF take structure parameters, and give call scopes back
DEF AREA(S@ AS RECT) = S@.W# * S@.H#
DEF POKEIT(P@ AS PTR TO RECT)
A parameter names its type, exactly as DIM does. A bare `DEF F(S@)` is refused:
@ says "a structure" without saying which, so it does not state a contract the
way S$ does, and accepting it would mean checking fields at the call rather than
at the declaration -- which is the hole naming the type closes. The cost is that
there are no generic functions, and that is a real loss rather than an oversight.
Passing is by value, because a parameter is bound by assignment and assignment
copies; a pointer parameter copies its reference and lets a function change its
caller's record on purpose. Neither is a special rule. What a structure
parameter does need is its storage prepared before the copy, since a structure
variable is a run of slots and there is nothing to copy into until the run
exists.
A DEF parameter list is no longer parsed as an argument list, because a
parameter is a declaration rather than an expression: `S@ AS RECT` stopped that
parser dead with "Unbalanced parenthesis".
akbasic_value_is_truthy() learned that a pointer is true when it points at
something, which had to come with this. Without it there is no way to test for
the end of a list at all -- comparing a pointer to 0 reads a numeric field it
does not carry and answers whatever that field held. A structure is deliberately
given no truth value: it always exists, so the question has no answer worth
guessing at.
And a regression I introduced last commit, plus the older one underneath it.
prev_environment() released a scope but not the variables the scope created, so
a call leaked one slot per parameter and two hundred calls exhausted the
128-slot pool. Giving each DEF call its own scope made that reachable; it was
there for GOSUB all along, measured on a stashed build -- a subroutine with a
local of its own failed after about 128 calls before any of this work. The
release is safe because a scope's table holds only what it created, and it is
the variable slot that comes back rather than its storage, so a pointer into a
record DIMmed in that scope stays sound.
Co-Authored-By: Claude Opus 5 (1M context) <noreply@anthropic.com>
2026-08-01 13:05:32 -04:00
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