[Info-vax] Bliss

[Lawrence D'Oliveiro]

On Fri, 12 Jul 2024 23:23:22 -0400, Hunter Goatley wrote:

> It's not much, but I successfully compiled a module. It complains about
> MAIN=main, and I'm not sure why, but I successfully created a .c with a
> main() that called my routine in the BLISS module (which called back to
> the C module to actually print some output). Pretty slick!

I was able to compile this example adapted from page 1-15 of the May
1987 “Bliss Language Reference Manual”:

    MODULE E1 (MAIN = CTRL) =
    BEGIN

        FORWARD ROUTINE
            CTRL,
            STEP;

        GLOBAL ROUTINE CTRL =
            !+
            ! This routine inputs a value, operates on it, and
            ! then outputs the result.
            !-
        BEGIN
            EXTERNAL ROUTINE
                GETNUM, ! Input a number from terminal
                PUTNUM; ! Output a number to terminal
            LOCAL
                X, ! Storage for input value
                Y; ! Storage for output value
            GETNUM(X);
            Y = STEP(.X);
            PUTNUM(.Y)
        END;

        ROUTINE STEP(A) =
            !+
            ! This routine adds 1 to the given value.
            !-
            (.A+1);

    END ELUDOM

That “MAIN =” elicited no complaints, but neither did it seem to do
anything useful. I was able to link the compiled code against this
driver program:

    #include <stdio.h>

    void GETNUM
      (
        int * x
      )
      {
        *x = 99;
      } /*getnum*/

    void PUTNUM
      (
        int x
      )
      {
        fprintf(stdout, "putnum(%d)\n", x);
      } /*putnum*/

    void CTRL(void);

    int main(void)
      {
        CTRL();
        return
            0;
      } /*main*/

And it output the message “putnum(100)”, as expected.