SIMPOL Documentation

In SIMPOL intrinsic functions are defined as functions that are always available (that are part of SIMPOL). They always begin with a dot (.), take a constant number of parameters (although the data type of the parameters may not be fixed), have no named parameters (so all parameters must always be specified), operate only on values and they always return a value. Also there is no function object to represent an intrinisic function. The dot operator preceds the function name to ensure that no user function can be defined that would conflict with a current or future intrinisic function (user functions cannot be defined with a name that begins with the dot operator).

The remainder of this chapter is divided into sections that briefly describe the various intrinsic functions grouped under a specific heading. The various types of intrinsic functions can be roughly grouped under the following headings:

The name of each group describes the type of functions that it includes. As time passes, the list of intrinsic functions will undoubtedly grow and quite possibly additional groups will be added as well. When that happens this section will be updated.