New Features for Compaq Visual Fortran Version 6.5 and 6.5A

New features added to Compaq Visual Fortran (Visual Fortran) Version 6.5A (since Visual Fortran Version 6.5) include the following:

• The Fortran COM Server now allows you to select an out-of-process (.EXE) COM server. Users now have a choice of the type of server, either a DLL (in-process) COM server and an EXE (out-of-process) COM server. Other Fortran COM Server enhancements allow array arguments to be assumed shape and you can now add the ISupportErrorInfo interface to your server.
• The following new compiler options have been added:
  • /assume:[no]protect_constants specifies whether constant actual arguments can be changed.
  • /check:arg_temp_created requests that a run-time informational message appear if actual arguments are copied into temporary storage before routine calls.
  • /warn:ignore_loc requests that the compiler issues warnings when %LOC is stripped from an argument
• The following new ATTRIBUTES directives have been added: ALLOW_NULL, DECORATE, IGNORE_LOC, and NOMIXED_STR_LEN_ARG
• The optional KIND argument has been added to INDEX, LEN_TRIM, MAXLOC, MINLOC, SCAN, and VERIFY intrinsic procedures.
• For additional new features and details, see the online release notes (relnotes.txt or relnotes.htm).
• New or significantly revised sections in the Programmer's Guide based on customer feedback include Coding Requirements for Fortran Windows Applications, Using Menus and Dialogs in SDI and MDI Fortran Windows Applications, Using the Resource Editor to Design a Dialog, and Compatibility with Compaq Fortran on Other Platforms.
• The section Pointer Arguments in the Language Reference has been significantly revised based on customer feedback.

New features added to Compaq Visual Fortran Version 6.5 (since Visual Fortran Version 6.1) include the following:

• The Fortran COM Server project type and the Fortran COM Server Wizard, described in Creating a COM Server. The Fortran COM Server Wizard helps you create a COM server or dual interface server. In addition, new information about using COM and Automation is provided in Getting a Pointer to an Object's Interface.
• New COM routines are provided:
  • COMStringFromGUID passes a GUID and returns the corresponding string representation.
  • COMIsEqualGUID determines if two GUIDs are the same.
• Visual Fortran now generates optimized code for the Intel^TM Pentium^TM III, AMD^TM K6, and AMD Athlon^TM architectures, by providing new keywords for the /arch and /tune compiler options.
• New intrinsic procedures added:
  • INT_PTR_KIND returns the INTEGER KIND that will hold an address.
  • KIND= is now an optional argument to the intrinsic procedures LEN, SHAPE, SIZE, LBOUND, and UBOUND.
  • For x86 systems, POPCNT, POPPAR, LEADZ, and TRAILZ perform bit-related operations on integer data.
• New exception handling routines are provided:
  
  
  • CLEARSTATUSFPQQ exception flags in the floating-point processor status word (x86 processors).
  • GETEXCEPTIONPTRSQQ returns a pointer to C run-time exception information pointers appropriate for use in signal handlers established with SIGNALQQ or direct calls to the C rtl signal() routine (x86 processors). For additional information about GETEXCEPTIONPTRSQQ, see Obtaining Traceback Information with TRACEBACKQQ and TRACEBACKQQ.
• The new QuickWin graphics routine SETTEXTCURSOR has been added to set the height and width of the text cursor (the caret) for the window in focus.
• The interface to the AUTOAddArg subroutine has changed. The output_arg argument (LOGICAL) is now the intent_arg argument (INTEGER). New code should use the new documented interface. The old interface is supported for compatibility purposes.
• New information about advanced exception handling and setting up various types of handlers for x86 systems is provided in Advanced Exception and Termination Handling Considerations.
• For non-native unformatted files, you can now use the FORT_CONVERT.ext or FORT_CONVERT_ext environment variable method to specify that files with certain file extensions (such as .DAT) are in a specified non-native format (see Methods of Specifying the Data Format). (Visual Fortran's native numeric formats are little endian, including IEEE floating-point formats.)
• Previous versions of Visual Fortran allowed only procedures and COMMON blocks to have the DLLEXPORT or DLLIMPORT ATTRIBUTE. You can now export/import module variables and arrays.
• A Visual Fortran compiled module now contains all of the information from modules used (USE statement) by the module. This may greatly increase the size of compiled modules, especially if the modules contain a USE DFWIN or USE DFWINTY statement. There are ways to minimize the information contained in compiled modules when calling Win32 routines, as described in Calling Win32 Routines and the Visual Fortran Windows Module.
• In order to conform with clarified wording in the Fortran 95 standard, the compiler has been changed so that when a READ statement encounters an end-of-file condition, and there is no END specifier but there is an ERR specifier, the ERR= branch is not taken. Similarly, if an end-of-record condition occurs but there is no EOR specifier, an ERR branch is not taken. If you do not specify a routine to handle such errors with the IOSTAT specifier, omitting the END or EOR specifier results in a severe run-time error (such as numbers 24 or 268 respectively).
• The run-time system has been changed to perform more thorough edit checking on list-directed input. In accordance with the Fortran 95 Standard, the run-time system no longer accepts as numeric input "+", "-", ".", "D", "E", or "Q" without expressing at least 1 digit. For example, the run-time system used to allow a single "+" to convert to a 0, but now it will return a FOR$IOS_LISIO_SYN (number 59) error. In addition, ambiguous expressions such as "+-" and "--" will be rejected
• Support has been added for reading nondelimited character strings as input for character NAMELIST items.
• The %VAL and %REF used on actual arguments now override any argument-passing mechanism specified in an explicit interface.
• New Visual Fortran Samples (described in Roadmap to the Visual Fortran Samples) are provided, including:
  • COM sample: Adder
  • DIALOG sample: Celsicon
  • ExceptionHandling samples: ClearFP, Cslexp2, Cslexp4, GetEptrs, Vbvf1, and Winexcp1
  • Isovar sample (ISO varying strings)
  • Mixed-language samples, new samples for MASM and Delphi
  • QuickWin samples: Conapp, Dirkeys4, PostMini, and Resize
  • Isovar, an ISO varying string sample
• Compiling modules is now faster.
• Concurrent-use licensing is now available.
• For additional new features and details, see the online release notes (relnotes.txt or relnotes.htm), located in the root directory of the Visual Fortran CD-ROM or installed in Program Files\Microsoft Visual Studio\Df98.
• New or significantly revised sections in the Programmer's Guide based on customer feedback include Specifying Consistent Library Types and Using the Console.

Changes to Compaq Array Visualizer are described separately in the Array Visualizer HTML Help documentation.