Talk:Stack

... is this really a task?

Not sure whether this is the right place to bring this up, but is this really a task? I mean: nothing is being done here. If the intended task is "implement a stack" then the reference to objects already implies a particular type of implementation (one that precludes functional languages, for example). But if it is really about objects, then isn't the task here really just "instantiate something from your library"? Sgeier 00:43, 24 February 2007 (EST)

I'm not sure what the purpose of the task is. The guy who created it wasn't logged in, so I don't know how we can ask. I'll throw a clarification template on it and take it out of the tasks category until it's been clarified. Also, the format isn't standard. It's interesting, but I think there are better ways to clarify the page layout than using the messagebox CSS class for the description.

Oh, and this is the perfect place to bring this up. --Short Circuit 10:32, 26 February 2007 (EST)

Ignoring the matter of whether an object oriented approach is required (or whether non-OO languages are precluded from this task) I would point out that many programming courses introduce stacks as a basic data structure and use the implementation of a stack with "push", "pop" and "depth" functions as a programming exercise. Granted that languages such as Python, Perl, Lisp/Scheme and Lua will make this a trivial program (but no more so than "Hello, World" which we also include as a task on this site). I think it's a fair task but perhaps the wording could be cleaned up.JimD 21:37, 1 November 2007 (MDT)

Additionally, as JimD said, a stack is a data structure. Shouldn't it also be in the data structures category? --mwn3d 18:37, 9 November 2007 (EST)

Moved

Moved this to data structures. --Short Circuit 14:23, 10 November 2007 (MST)

Deleted paragraph

The task formerly contained this paragraph: "Stacks as a containers presume copyable elements. I.e. stack elements have by-value semantics. This means that when an element is pushed onto the stack, a new instance of the element's type is created. This instance has a value equivalent to one the pushed element."

I deleted this paragraph because the code ignored it. The implementations for Common Lisp, Factor, and Ruby copy references to objects; they never make "a new instance of the element's type". In general, stacks never presume to make such new instances. --Kernigh 19:07, 15 September 2011 (UTC)