Hello all,

generally strong typing is required for communication operations. Is this also
valid for the address template used in the "send to" construct?
If yes how would this look like:

type integer MyInt(0..255);
type MyInt MyIntAlias;
type address MyInt;
...
p.send(...) to 10; // is this correct?
p.send(...) to MyInt:10; // or this
p.send(...) to address:10; // or this

var MyIntAlias v := 10;
p.send(...) to v; // what about this


thank you in advance for your suggestions

In my opinion, the address needs not to be strongly typed as that is normally
a meta-information (about the actual message) and the type is not needed to
decode the address (whereas it is needed for decoding the message). The
important thing should only be that the value being used is compatible to the
address type.

So, I would say that all of the above should work the same.

BR, Jacob Wieland

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Hi,

Actually, the current text of the standard is not so clean in this respect = in
6.3.4:
"The communication operations (see clause 22) ... are exceptions to the wea= ker
rule of type compatibility and require strong typing. The types of valu= es or
templates directly used as parameters to these operations must also b= e
explicitly defined in the associated port type definition. Strong typing = also
applies to storing the received value, address or component reference = during a
receive or trigger operation."

So, is the address a "parameter" for these operations? I think so. On the o=
ther hand, in earlier versions of the standard it was not possible to list = the
address type in the port type definition... But once strong typing is r= equired
for storing, why it would not be required in the operation itself?

I do not agree that address is "just" a metainformation (at least not alway= s).
On mapped ports this may be an addressing information WITHIN THE SUT, h= ence
may need to be encoded AND decoded just like the message itself. E.g.= if
testing layers 6-7 of the SS7 protocol stack, this may be an SCCP addre= ss of
different kinds like Signalling Point Code, Subsystem Number, Global = Title,
but all in a definite format specified by the SCCP protocol spec.

And also, the adapters should know the type of the address and therefore de=
pending on the implementation language a weak type compatibility for addres= s
may cause problems. Therefore I would say that it is safer to consider th= at
address also requires strong typing with one exception: type synonyms sh= ould
be allowed due to importing the address type to other modules.

BR, Gyorgy