Re: avoiding copying arguments by value when calling a function

[Jordi Gutiérrez Hermoso]

On 20 August 2012 10:25, Sergei Steshenko <address@hidden> wrote:
> On Mon, 8/20/12, Carnë Draug <address@hidden> wrote:
>> On 20 August 2012 14:55, Sergei Steshenko <address@hidden>
>> wrote:
> [snip]
>> Seems the manual
>> http://www.gnu.org/software/octave/doc/interpreter/Call-by-Value.html
>> is incorrect.
> [snip]
>> Carnë
>>
>
> FTM: "each argument in a function call is evaluated and assigned to
> a temporary location in memory before being passed to the function."
>
> well, in the light of given explanations indeed incorrect. i.e. bug
> in documentation.

COWs look like pass by value if you ignore memory allocation. From the
user's point of view, a COW *is* pass by value. COWs are supposed to
be a transparent optimisation. This is why the manual further down
says,

    Even though Octave uses pass-by-value semantics for function
    arguments, values are not copied unnecessarily.

I don't think there is a documentation bug.

- Jordi G. H.