On Mar 2, 2012, at 1:51 AM, Johan Vromans wrote: > Nicholas Clark <n...@ccl4.org> writes: > >> So I'd like to know, if a programmer on VMS sets $/ to read records, but on >> a file handle marked with :utf8, what do they want? >> >> (and if the answer is "their head examining", that's actually useful, as it >> means that the least insane thing to implement is what we get) > > In VMS, and its predecessor RSX, the purpose of a file with fixed width > records has always been that you can easily and efficiently retrieve a > specific record at all times. These files were often referred to as > 'random access files'. Random access files typically didn't have record > terminators. > > In flat files systems, you can find record NNN by seeking to position > NNN*width, and seeking loses its efficiency when done on characters.
Not really relevant to the discussion of $/ and UTF-8, but to be pedantically correct, relative access to files with fixed-length records is only one of several random access methods available on VMS. The others don't require the records to be fixed length. ________________________________________ Craig A. Berry mailto:craigbe...@mac.com "... getting out of a sonnet is much more difficult than getting in." Brad Leithauser
