[MPIWG Fortran] ticket 351

[Jeff Hammond]

>> 2) I don't really see the point of this at all.  The user can just call
>> the native Fortran intrinsics directly.  Why should there be a duplicate
>> version that starts with MPI_ ?  I would suggest, instead, that you just add
>> a note in the spec (advice to users) point out that Fortran programmers can
>> access the command line arguments using the language intrinsics.   Maybe
>> someone can convince me this is not adequate, but I've been using those
>> intrinsics with parallel programs for some time and they work just fine.
>
> I assume that the desire for this is to support the systems which do not
> use a mpiexec/mpirun command, but fire up MPI directly, as IBM poe does.

I merely want to provide symmetry in the standard.  This is an
important aspect and why we provide all a number of features that do
not necessarily make sense in isolation.

> However, I have always felt that the original C approach was a horrible
> hack, just as having C's argument list (and arguments) writable is.
> There were good reasons at the time but, given that Fortran has done
> without it with little to no trouble for so long, I agree with Bill.

I do not see how Fortran has any power to fix this any more than C
does.  The perceived superiority of Fortran over C is not a valid
argument within the MPI Forum.  The MPI Forum only addressed the C
case because Fortran did not have a standard way to access argc/argv
until the 2003 specification.

I do not understand your apparent argument that argc/argv are not
useful.  Do you assume that Fortran applications always use the exact
same input filename?  I know many Fortran codes that do this and it's
really sad to see how they contort to provide a general workflow.

Jeff

-- 
Jeff Hammond
jeff.science at gmail.com