jwohl@eeserv1.ic.sunysb.edu (Jeremy Wohl) (03/31/91)
I keep seeing references to v2.3 and (soon) v3.0 of the Eiffel development system. What version corresponds to that language revision in Meyer's book (10th printing, 1988)? What changes were made since then? Thanks. -- Jeremy Wohl / wohl@max.physics.sunysb.edu / jwohl@csserv1.ic.sunysb.edu
bertrand@eiffel.UUCP (Bertrand Meyer) (04/01/91)
From <1991Mar30.210218.4308@sbcs.sunysb.edu> by jwohl@eeserv1.ic.sunysb.edu (Jeremy Wohl): > I keep seeing references to v2.3 and (soon) v3.0 of the Eiffel development > system. What version corresponds to that language revision in > [Object-Oriented Software Construction] (10th printing, 1988)? > What changes were made since then? The version currently supported by Interactive's implementation is 2.3. The book OOSC described an earlier version (2.1, I believe). The 2.3 language is actually the same as 2.2 (changes from 2.2 to 2.3 affected the libraries and the environment but not the language). It is described in full in the book ``Eiffel: The Language'' as available from Interactive. The 2.2 version (and hence 2.3) is 2.1 extended with a small number of new facilities, in particular reverse assignment attempt and constrained genericity. Version 3 (without a qualifier) is described in the revised version of ``Eiffel: The Language'' to be published real-soon-now by Prentice-Hall. It is not yet supported by any implementation, although SiG Computer (from Germany) have announced that their MS-DOS implementation, to be commercially available late Spring, will support Eiffel 3. The changes from 2.3 to 3 are some extensions and a cleanup of several aspects of the language. Many of them have been discussed on comp.lang.eiffel. To ensure a smooth transition, Interactive will make a 2.3-to-3 translator available when we release our own Eiffel 3 environment. It should be emphasized that the changes brought to the language since the publication of OOSC have enhanced practical usability but have not affected the basic ideas developed in that book, which remains essentially applicable as it stands. -- -- Bertrand Meyer Interactive Software Engineering Inc., Santa Barbara bertrand@eiffel.uucp