To: J3                                                     J3/22-156
From: Steve Lionel
Subject: Remove uses of dummy as a noun
Date: 2022-June-23

Reference: 21-007r1

INCITS has an "inclusive language" document that lists various
word choices that are said to be offensive to some, for example
blacklist/whitelist, master/slave, etc. The current draft avoids such
problematic language. However, we recently received a request from an
outside source expressing concern over Fortran's use of "dummy", which
in certain slang noun contexts can refer to someone who cannot speak.

The Fortran standard contains 802 uses of the word "dummy"; all but
three are as an adjective ("dummy argument", "dummy object", etc.),
and the response sent (authored by myself, Malcolm, and David)
expressed the opinion that these adjective uses were not problematic.
We also pointed out that "dummy argument" and similar are "terms of art"
widely used across programming language standards to mean a name that
is a local name referencing another entity. We did, however,
identify three cases where "dummy" was used as a noun and we agreed to
change those; hence this paper.

Edits
-----

109:10 (8.5.10 INTENT attribute) - replace "pointer dummy" with
"dummy pointer"

113:Note 1 (8.5.117 RANK clause) - Replace "assumed-shape (dummy)"
with "assumed-shape", and replace "Scalar dummy" with "Scalar".

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