J3/04-408r1 Date: 09 Nov 2004 To: J3 From: Rob James Subject: Kinds of intrinsic type parameters - f2003 interp NUMBER: F03/0020 TITLE: Kinds of intrinsic type parameters KEYWORDS: type parameter, kind, intrinsic type DEFECT TYPE: Errata STATUS: Submitted QUESTION: Q1. What are the kinds of the type parameters for intrinsic types? In most contexts, it doesn't matter. Fortran 95 did not even have the concept of the kind of a type parameter or a context in which such a thing could be detected in a standard-conforming program. Fortran 2003 added the concept in support of derived types. It also added a syntax which exposes the question for intrinsic types. Q2. What is the KIND of a type parameter inquiry? Q3. For example, consider the program program what_kind character c write (*,*) kind(c%kind) == kind(0) write (*,*) kind(c%len) == kind(0) end Are both write statements guaranteed to print .true. (meaning that the c%kind and c%len are of default kind) or not? For KIND parameters, although I can't find it explicitly stated, I see fairly strong evidence that all intrinsic kind parameters are intended to be default integers. This evidence is in the intrinsic functions. The KIND intrinsic function and all the selected_*_kind functions are specified to return default integers, which would make for some strangeness if the kind parameters were not default integer, in particular if the KIND intrinsic could not return the kind of its argument because that kind could not be represented in a default integer. There also seems no obvious benefit to having the kind of the intrinsic kind parameters be anything other than default. In practice, the number of supported values for kind is small and would have no trouble being represented in a default integer; large arrays of kind values are rare, so there isn't much benefit in using representations smaller than default. For character length, I see no similar evidence. Indeed, the LEN intrinsic seems to suggest that lengths might be other than default integer. I believe that there was clear intent to facilitate (but not require) support for character lengths longer than could be expressed by a default integer. In most contexts, it doesn't directly matter what the kind of length is. Parameter specifications in type-specs don't have to match in kind. So the user could specify and do arithmetic on lengths using whatever kind was appropriate for the anticipated problem sizes. The limit on maximum character length is processor-dependent anyway and is not necessarily the same as HUGE(whatever) (though it is a bit hard to imagine how it could usefully be larger). The only context in which I can see that might matter is in a type parameter inquiry (6.1.3). We don't appear to have defined the kind of a type parameter inquiry. Although we didn't say, I am assuming that a type parameter inquiry ought to "return" the kind of the type parameter it is inquiring about. Otherwise, there would be no way to inquire about the type parameter values of some derived type variables (if the values didn't fit in a default integer). We probably ought to explicitly say, though. ANSWER: Q1. The kind parameters of all the intrinsic types are of default integer kind. The kind parameter of the intrinsic character length parameter is processor-dependent. The support for this answer is as described in the question. Edits are provided to make this answer explicit. Q2. The kind parameter of a type inquiry is the same as that of the type parameter inquired about. See page 123, lines 35-36. Q3. The first write statement is guaranteed to print a .true. value; it is processor dependent whether the second one prints a .true. or .false. value. EDITS: All edits apply to 04-007. At [36:14], [37:30], [39:15], [40:14], and [44:2], insert the following sentence before "The kind": The kind type parameter is of type default integer. At [40:10], before "its", insert "its kind is processor-dependent and". SUBMITTED BY: Richard Maine HISTORY: J3/04-408 m170 Submitted J3/04-408r1 m170 Edits provided