Newsgroups: rec.arts.int-fiction
Path: nntp.gmd.de!stern.fokus.gmd.de!zib-berlin.de!uni-paderborn.de!golden-gate.owl.de!fu-berlin.de!news.belwue.de!news.uni-stuttgart.de!rz.uni-karlsruhe.de!blackbush.xlink.net!tank.news.pipex.net!pipex!usenet.eel.ufl.edu!bofh.dot!newsfeed.internetmci.com!in1.uu.net!world!olorin
From: olorin@world.std.com (Mark J Musante)
Subject: Re: [Inform] list_together problems
Message-ID: <DrEuGn.H08@world.std.com>
Organization: The World @ Software Tool & Die
X-Newsreader: TIN [version 1.2 PL2]
References: <31978079.6EF3@whirlwind.llnl.gov> <yxsspd3ia66.fsf@stint.cl.cam.ac.uk>
Date: Tue, 14 May 1996 19:36:23 GMT
Lines: 31

Gareth Rees (gdr11@cl.cam.ac.uk) wrote:
> Kathleen Fischer <kfischer@greenhouse.llnl.gov> wrote:
> > I would like to use list_together to, well, have a bunch of stuff listed 
> > together... so, I created 3 classes:
> > 
> > Class junkmail_class
> >    with name "junk" "mail",
> >         list_together "mail";
> > 
> > Class billmail_class
> >    with name "bill" "mail"
> >         plural "bills",
> >         list_together "mail";
> > 
> > Class lettermail_class
> >    with name "letter" "mail"
> >         plural "letters",
> >         list_together "mail";

> When the Inform compiler comes across a string in double quotes (except
> as part of the `name' property) it encodes the string, puts the string
> somewhere at the end of the Z-code, and uses the packed address of the
> string instead of the string itself.

> Since you wrote the string "mail" three times, Inform compiled it three
> times, and each class has a different packed address!

How trivial/complex a task would it be to get Inform to re-use strings?  Sounds
like a useful optimisation.

 - Mark
