> The way we informally talk about programming concepts (like “pass a variable”), and the syntactic choices our languages make (like return x), are almost certainly also sources of confusion. The former can naturally lead students to believe variables are being aliased, and the latter can lead them to believe the variable, rather than its value, is being returned.
There's the problem right there: any informal talk about programming concepts is bound to lead to confusion because informal language is open to interpretation (no pun intended). That's why we have formal definitions for these terms, as well as language specs which define how pass-by-value and pass-by-reference (if applicable) and pass-by-address (if applicable) work in a given language.
There's the problem right there: any informal talk about programming concepts is bound to lead to confusion because informal language is open to interpretation (no pun intended). That's why we have formal definitions for these terms, as well as language specs which define how pass-by-value and pass-by-reference (if applicable) and pass-by-address (if applicable) work in a given language.