Large routine arguments

chulett · Post by **chulett** » Fri Feb 20, 2009 4:15 pm

Just wondering if I should be concerned about something.

I'm taking a routine that passes in as one of its arguments a dynamic array of indeterminate size and modifying it to take three arrays. I really can't say how large is 'large' as they will change in size from run to run and call to call but I don't think it would be anything I'd consider exceptionally large. So... anything to worry about, performance wise, ya think?

ray.wurlod · Post by **ray.wurlod** » Fri Feb 20, 2009 5:02 pm

Nah. All arguments are passed by reference - that is, the address of the string in memory is all that's passed to the routine.

That was, of course, a slight lie. What is actually passed is a DATUM, an internal, 16-byte structure that includes the address and also other information about the string, such as whether a REUSE() function is in effect, the field mark "hint" position for REMOVE, and so on.

But it's a good enough explanation. The moral of the story is that huge strings are not passed.

chulett · Post by **chulett** » Fri Feb 20, 2009 5:08 pm

Good. I seemed to recall you stating this in the past but wanted to double-check. Thanks! :D