• Must compile the whole of Fortran
• ENTRY, EQUIVALENCE, COMMON, contained routines
• The .NET environment assumes that routine interfaces are always present
• No (public) .NET object format
• .NET arrays are inefficient and do not work with EQUIVALENCE or COMMON

• Re-introduce object format (.DBK)
• Linker DBK_LINK creates assemblies in a Fortran aware fashion
• Link diagnostics are Fortran specific
• DBK_LINK resolves ENTRY statements and contained routines
• Matches routine calls in a Fortran specific fashion
• Every Fortran routine becomes a static method of a class. MODULE's and COMMON become static members.

• Arrays use unmanaged memory - array bound checking is added as required
• Fortran does not satisfy PEVERIFY - unsafe constructs JIT to efficient code
• Some calls to WIN32 in the short term
• Entry points share data, but not code
• EQUIVALENCE handled using structs and unmanaged memory

• Call non-FTN95 methods with

  assembly_external

• Expose CLS compliant interface with

  assembly_interface

• .NET objects with

  object('System.Int32')

• Exception handling with

  try...throw...catch...finally...end try

• Create or call a method in a class :

  subroutine blah(s)
     character(len=*), intent(in) :: s
     assembly_interface(name='WriteLine')
     assembly_external(name='System.Console.WriteLine') foo
     call foo('{0}, world.', s)
  end subroutine
  

Integration with the Common Language Specification

(CLR = Common Language Runtime)

• Trapping an exception :

  try
     call do_something
     catch(exception)
     call recover
     finally
     call cleanup_regardless
  end try
  

• Using .NET objects :

          object("System.String")str,str1
          Object('System.Object')obj             
          character*10 fred
          fred="r"
          str=new@("System.String",fred)
          obj=cast@(str,"System.Object")
          str1=cast@(obj,"System.String")
          call wr(str1)
          end