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| Authored by: Ian Al on Monday, May 28 2012 @ 03:49 AM EDT |
I've been thinking about 'conceptual contract'.
I ended up with the shock realisation that the Java SE API is not an API. The
written contract is that if the many libraries are available to the compiler
then the compiler will execute the contract. If the named library code is not
present, then the compiler will not execute the contract.
The execution in the case of Java appears to me to be the copying of code into
the executable. In the case of Sony, it is a real API in that the contract says
that when certain instructions and parameters are 'passed across the interface'
then the receiving program will do certain things and respond with certain
data.
In the Sony case, it is both API and ABI because there are both implied
metaphors and contracts and there are simple exchanges of instructions and data
(ABIs are almost always bi-directional in that they will usually respond if the
instruction or data is invalid or if the receiving program has a partial
failure).
The most complex PI is the operating system interface. It is not intended just
for the highest level languages. Any API contracts, agreements or metaphors
exist even if assembly language is used to create a program that interfaces with
the operating system.
APIs have a richer capability of expressing the contract and the metaphors in an
understandable way using the language syntax. ABIs must have that richness
expressed in comments.
In both cases, the words in the specification/comments express the contract, but
in neither case is that contract apparent in the machine code. Because an API
has a richer contractual vocabulary in the language syntax, it has to have an
unwritten or written ABI in the path to using the interface.
---
Regards
Ian Al
Software Patents: It's the disclosed functions in the patent, stupid![ Reply to This | Parent | # ]
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- API != ABI - Authored by: Anonymous on Monday, May 28 2012 @ 08:12 AM EDT
- Pedantry! - Authored by: Ian Al on Monday, May 28 2012 @ 02:14 PM EDT
- Pedantry! - Authored by: Anonymous on Monday, May 28 2012 @ 02:25 PM EDT
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