NAME
    protect - read or adjust protect status for a variable or named block

SYNOPSIS
    protect(var [, N [, depth])
    protect(nblk [, N [, depth]])

TYPES
    var		lvalue
    nblk	named block
    N		integer, abs(N) < 65536
    depth	nonnegative integer

    return	null value

DESCRIPTION
    The protection status of the association of an lvalue A with
    its value is represented by a nonnegative integer less than 2^16.
    The current value sts of this status is returned by protect(A).
    Each nonzero bit of the low eight bits of sts corresponds to a
    builtin kind of protection as follows:

	bit value 	protection

	      1	no assign to A
	      2	no change of A by assignment
	      4	no change of type value of A
	      8	no error value for A
	     16	no copy to A
	     32	no relocation for A or its elements
	     64	no assign from A
	    128	no copy from A

    For example, A having protection status 65 = 1 + 64 prevents
    execution of assignments of the forms A = expression and V = A
    where V is an lvalue. Attempting either of these assignments
    will return an error value and leave the value of A or V unchanged.

    Initally, when created, any lvalue A has zero status corresponding
    to "no protection". This may be restored at any time by protect(A, 0).

    If N is positive and A does not already have the protection
    corresponding to a nonzero bit of N, protect(A, N) adds that
    protection to the status of A. For example, if protect(A) is 65,
    protect(A, 17) will add the no-copy-to protection so that the
    new protection status of A will be 81 = 1 + 16 + 64.

    Similarly, if N is negative and A has the protection corresponding
    to a nonzero bit of abs(N), protect(A,N) will remove that kind of
    protection. For example if protect(A) = 65, then protect(A, -17)
    will remove the no-assign-to protection and the new value of
    protect(A) will be 64. Note that protect(A, -65535) has the same
    effect as protect(A, 0).

    For the purposes of this function, the depth of a global or local
    variable is zero; if A has depth d and the value of A is a list,
    matrix, object or association, its elements have depth d + 1.
    For example, after:

	; obj point {x,y}
	; X = mat[3] = {1, list(2,3), mat[2] = {obj point, obj point} }

    X has depth 0; X[0], X[1] and X[2] have depth 1; X[1][0], X[1][1],
    X[2][0] and X[2][1] have depth 2; X[2][0].x, X[2][0].y, X[2][1].x
    and X[2][1].y have depth 3. For any lvalue A, protect(A, N, depth)
    applies protect(A, N) to A and to all elements, elements of
    elements, etc., up tothe stated depth. In the above example,
    protect(X, 20, 2) gives no-type-change and no-copy-to protection
    to 8 of the listed lvalues, but not to the components of the
    objects X[2][0] and X[2][1]; With any d >= 3, protect(X, 20, d)
    would give that protection the 12 listed lvalues.

    If B is a variable with positive status and assignment of B to A is
    permitted, execution of the assignment A = B adds to the protections
    of A all protections of B that A does not already have. Except when
    the value returned is the result of the evqluation of an lvalue with
    positive status, calc's builtin operators and functions return values
    with zero protection status. For example, whatever the protection
    statuses of X and Y, X + sqrt(Y) will have zero status, but
    t ? X : Y may have nonzero status. The list, matrix, object or
    association returned by the use of list, mat, obj or assoc will have
    zero status, but any element specified by an lvalue will receive
    its status; e.g. after  L = list(X, X^2) , protect(L[0]) equals
    protect(X) and both protect(L) and protect(L[1]) are zero.

    Users may define functions that return values with positive status, e.g.

	; define noassigntovalue(x) {protect(x,1); return x};
	; S = noassigntovalue(42);

    will result in S having the value 42 and no-assign-to protection.
    By using a backquote with a variable as argument, an even simpler
    function:

	; define noassignto(x) = protect(x, 1);

    gives no-assign-to protection to the variable; i.e. noassignto(`A)
    achieves the same as protect(A,1).

    In the brief descriptions above of builtin kinds of protectiopn,
    "assign" refers to use of '=' as in A = expr to assign the value
    of expr to A, and in A = {..., expr, ...} to assign the value of expr
    to some component of A, and to the assignments implicit in
    quomod(x, y, A, B), and pre or post ++ or --. Swapping of lvalues is
    prevented if either value has no-assign-to or no-assign-from
    protection. (Swapping of octets is prevented if at least one of
    them is in a string or block with no-copy-to or no-copy-from
    protection.)

    "Copying" refers to initialization using {...} and to the operations
    copy and blkcpy as applied to strings, blocks, lists and matrices.
    Although A = {..., expr, ...) assigns the value of expr to an
    elment of A, it is also regarded as copying to A. Thus, initialization
    of A may be prevented either by giving no-copy-to protection to A or
    no-assignment=to protection to the elements of A. Assignments to and
    from characters or octets in strings or blocks are also regarded as
    copying to or from the string or block. For example, after
    A = "abc", protect(A,16) would prevent the assignment A[0] = 'x'.
    (Note that in this example, A[0] is not an lvalue in the sense
    normally understood - the only values it can have are nonnegative
    integers less than 256. The only kinds of protection relevant to an
    octet are the no-copy-to, no-copy-from and no-change protections of
    the string or block in which the octet resides.)

    The no-relocate protection applies to lists and blocks. For lists,
    it refers to the operations push, pop, append, remove, insert and
    delete. For example, if A = list(2,3,5,7), protect(A, 32) will
    prevent any change in the content or size of the list.
    No-relocation protection of a block prevents reallocation of the
    memory used by a block and the freeing of a named block, For example,
    if a block B has maxsize 256, then after:

	; protect(B, 32);

    copy(A, B) will fail if the copying would cause size(B) to equal or
    exceed 256; if B is a named block, blkfree(B) will not be permitted.

    The elements of the list returned by list(...) will initially have zero
    protection status except when an argument is an lvalue with positive
    status, in which case the corresponding element will receive that
    status. E.g., L = list(A,B) will result in L[0] having status
    protect(A) and L[1] having status protect(B). L itself will have
    the status L had before the assignment. There is a similar copying
    of protection status when "= { ... }" initialization is used for
    matrices, lists or objects. For example, except when A or B has
    no-assign-from protection, M = mat [2] = {A,B} or mat M[2] = {A,B}
    will result in M[0] and M[1] having statuses protect(A) and
    protect(B) respectively. (If A or B has no-assign-from protection,
    mat[2] = {A,B} returns an error value.)

    Although M = mat[2] = {...} and mat M[2] = {...} do the same thing,
    these are different from (M = mat[2]) = {...} and (mat M[3]) = {...}.
    In the former pair of statements, the result of mat[2] = {...} is being
    assigned to M.  In the latter statments, a matrix with zero elements is
    being assigned to M and then that matrix is being "reinitialized". Both
    will fail if M has no-asssign-to protection, but only the latter
    would be prevented by M having no-copy-to protection.

    When the functions which mave move elements like of sort, reverse,
    swap, insert, pop, remove, push and append. are evaluated, the
    protection statuses move with the values, e.g. if among the values
    and elements involved, there is just one with value 42, then the
    lvalue to which the value 42 is moved will get the status the lvalue
    with value 42 had before the evaluation of the function. This is
    relevant to evaluation of expressions like A = sort(A),
    append(A, pop(A)), insert(A,2,B,C). Note that when pop(A) is first
    evaluated it is located on the stack calc uses for calculating
    expressions rather than being the value of an lvalue. With an
    explicit assignment like X = pop(A) or the implied assignment in
    append(A, pop(A)), it becomes the value of an lvalue.

    Users may use higher bits values for other kinds of protection or
    simply to store information about an lvalue and its current value.
    For example 1024 might be used to indicate that the lvalue is always
    to have positive value.  Then code for evaluating a function might
    include lines like

	; if (protect(A) & 1024 && B <= 0) {
	;; return newerror("Prohibited assignment");
	;; }
	; A = B;

    When an operation forbidden by a particular bit in the protection
    status of A is attempted, an error value is created but unless this
    causes errcount to exceed errmax, the only immediate evidence
    for the error might be the incrementing of errcount. Sometimes the
    failure causes the return of the error value; e.g. swap(A,B) if
    not permitted returns an appropriate error value rather than the
    null value.  If the value of A is a number and A has no-type-change
    protection, A = "abc" returns an error value. The error-number of
    the most recent error value is returned by errno(), a string
    describing it by strerror().

    A named block may be referred to by using the blocks() or blk()
    functions, or by assigning it to a variable A and then using either
    A or *A.  In the latter cases, protect(A, sts) sets the status for
    the variable A; protect(*A, sts) assigns the status for the named
    block.  For example, protect(*A,16) will prevent any copying to the
    named block; protect(A,16) will prevent any copying to the named block
    only when it is referred to by A.

EXAMPLE

    ; A = 27
    ; protect(A,1)
    ; A = 45
    ; A
	    27
    ; strerror()
	    "No-assign-to destination for assign"
    ; protect(A,64)
    ; protect(A)
	    65
    ; X = A
    ; X
	    0
    ; strerror()
	    "No-assign-from source for assign"
    ; protect(A,-1)
    ; protect(A)
	    64
    ; protect(A,4)
    ; protect(A)
	    68
    ; A = "abc"
    ; A
	    27
    ; strerror()
	    "No-type-change destination for assign"
    ; B = 45
    ; swap(A,B)
	    Error 10372
    ; strerror()
	    "No-assign-to-or-from argument for swap"
    ; protect(A,-64)
    ; protect(A)
	    4
    ; swap(A,B)
    ; A
	    45
    ; B
	    27

    ; A = mat[4] = {1,2,3,4}
    ; B = list(5,6,7,8)
    ; protect(A,16)
    ; copy(B,A)
	    Error 10226
    ; strerror()
	    "No-copy-to destination variable"

    ; A = list(1,2,3)
    ; protect(A,32)
    ; append(A,4)
	    Error 10402
    ; strerror()
	    "No-relocate for list append"

    ; A = blk(0,5)
    ; copy("abc", A)
    ; copy("de",A)
	    Error 10229
    ; strerror()
	    "No-relocate destination variable"

    ; A = blk("alpha") = {1,2,3,4,5}
    ; protect(A,0)
    ; protect(*A, 16)
    ; copy("abc", A)
	    Error 10228
    ; strerror()
	    "No-copy-to destination named block"

LIMITS
    none

LINK LIBRARY
    none

SEE ALSO
    assign, copy, blk, error, errno, strerror

## Copyright (C) 1999-2006  Landon Curt Noll
##
## Calc is open software; you can redistribute it and/or modify it under
## the terms of the version 2.1 of the GNU Lesser General Public License
## as published by the Free Software Foundation.
##
## Calc is distributed in the hope that it will be useful, but WITHOUT
## ANY WARRANTY; without even the implied warranty of MERCHANTABILITY
## or FITNESS FOR A PARTICULAR PURPOSE.	 See the GNU Lesser General
## Public License for more details.
##
## A copy of version 2.1 of the GNU Lesser General Public License is
## distributed with calc under the filename COPYING-LGPL.  You should have
## received a copy with calc; if not, write to Free Software Foundation, Inc.
## 51 Franklin Street, Fifth Floor, Boston, MA  02110-1301, USA.
##
## Under source code control:	1997/07/10 22:38:44
## File existed as early as:	1997
##
## chongo <was here> /\oo/\	http://www.isthe.com/chongo/
## Share and enjoy!  :-)	http://www.isthe.com/chongo/tech/comp/calc/
