schultz (11/30/82)
#R:presby:-13900:uiucdcs:27900001:000:1555
uiucdcs!schultz Nov 29 21:01:00 1982
I have had some experience with the 8086 version of Pascal MT+ and JRT Pascal.
MT+ is a very good compiler and I'd recommend it if you want to spend the money
for it. It is reliable, supports 'standard Pascal', and has a few (but not
TOO many) extensions to make it usable on a micro. It appears to generate
fairly tight object code. I have not tried to transport very many programs
from/to MT+. It does have seperate compilation, but the linkage step can be
quite time consuming.
JRT Pascal, on the other hand, is quite questionable. I have it running
on a Z80 and am having a hard time moving working Pascal programs to JRT.
Problem 1 is that JRT has so many extra features added that there are more
reserved words like 'length' and 'page' that you can't use for identifier
names. Problem 2 deals with troubles with parameter passing. JRT seems to
choke a little when you try to pass record-type data in procedures. I am
still trying to isolate this difficulty, and send as short a program as possible
to JRT to illustrate this problem. All I know is that when I take a working
Pascal 6000 program (or the pascal on unix) and transport it to JRT,
some procedure calls return funny results.
I'd say if you are serious about CP/M Pascal, get MT+; otherwise JRT
is fun to mess with. With considerable tweeking, JRT can do some neat stuff.
Sorry, I haven't done anything with the database.
I'd also be interested in hearing from anyone who has Pascal/Z or other
implementations of CP/M Pascal. I'd like to see some comparisons...