[Oberon] Oberon and closures

[Douglas G. Danforth]

Martin Bishop wrote:
> Is it possible to create a closure in Oberon?  If not, why not? what
> prevent it?
> --
> Oberon at lists.inf.ethz.ch mailing list for ETH Oberon and related systems
> https://lists.inf.ethz.ch/mailman/listinfo/oberon
>   
 From Wikipedia we find

"

In computer science <http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Computer_science>, a 
*closure* is a function 
<http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Function_%28programming%29> that is 
evaluated in an environment containing one or more bound variables 
<http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bound_variable>. When called, the function 
can access these variables. The explicit use of closures is associated 
with functional programming 
<http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Functional_programming> and with languages 
such as ML <http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/ML_programming_language> and 
Lisp <http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lisp_%28programming_language%29>. 
Constructs such as objects 
<http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Object_oriented_programming> in other 
languages can also be modeled with closures.

In some languages, a closure may occur when a function is defined within 
another function, and the inner function refers to local variables of 
the outer function. At runtime <http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Runtime>, 
when the outer function executes, a closure is formed, consisting of the 
inner function’s code and references to any variables of the outer 
function required by the closure.

A closure can be used to associate a function with a set of "private" 
variables, which persist over several invocations of the function. The 
scope <http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Scope_%28programming%29> of the 
variable encompasses only the closed-over function, so it cannot be 
accessed from other program code. However, the variable is of indefinite 
extent <http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Variable#Scope_and_extent>, so a 
value established in one invocation remains available in the next. As a 
consequence, closures can be used to hide state 
<http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Information_hiding>, and thus to implement 
object-oriented programming 
<http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Object-oriented_programming>.

"
Global variables in an Oberon module act like the bound variables for 
every procedure of the module that accesses those variables.
Oberon-2 and Component Pascal allow for functions within functions and 
so the above hold for the local variables in the outer
procedure.

So, yes, you can create a closure in Oberon.

-Doug Danforth