Re: Symbol tables and scopes

Alex Colvin <alexc@TheWorld.com> wrote:
> >> It looks like inefficient to me, when for every currently visible scope
> >> the block id must be compared with the id's of *all* possible blocks?
>
> Figure that a name is declared in very few blocks, but some blocks contain
> very many names. Typically, the outermost scope contains hundreds of
> global names that are never redeclared. I believe this is called the "Big
> Inhale"


      Depends on the language and programming style. It may be true for
C, Pascal and similiar languages, but i question the validity on a
typical C++ program for example. Definitely a reasonably well designed
program will attempt to minimize the # of global variables, if the
language allows it.


      Anyway the poster needs only to search scope form inner most
outward until the variable is found, not all possible blocks.

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