We describe a technique for beginning students to read and verbalize a declarator in the C programming language. Once learned, students will be able to easily state the type of an object without hesitation. It is suggested that this technique be taught to students during the first week of an introductory C programming course. Getting students to correctly read and verbalize types hastens their learning of the language and supports necessary discussion of a program's translation and execution environments.

is superintendent of Eaton (Pa.) Area School District. Faddishness is one of the terrible things bedeviling American education today. The public in general, and educators in particular, are bombarded by a steady cascade of reports, studies, commissions, and other impulses for school betterment.Almost everybody gets into the act. U.S. and state departments of education, governors, legislators, foundations, universities, national union 1'eaders, and prominent people all have a go at telling the country what is needed for our ailing schools.To the public at large, the effect of all this is confusion, and after awhile they tune the whole thing out.To educators, this panorama is often discouraging. The din of criticism, the indiscriminate mix of good and bad ideas, and above all, the lack of commitment to support effective change in any substantial way, suggest to us that all the above is &dquo;sound and fury&dquo; signifying nothing. Like the public, we are tempted to tune the whole thing out.To pull the covers over our head on school reform, however, would be a grave mistake, for two reasons.First, there are real problems in American public education today, and as committed conscientious professionals we cannot ignore them.Second, if we do not take the lead in reform, then others will do it for us.People less knowledgeable and less involved will change our professional environment and we will have to live with it.

Sharing the components of a data object among asynchronous processes is discussed in the contezt of the classic "Readers and Writers" problem. Distinct process groups identified as "Readers" and n Writers* contend for access to the data object with the provision that "Readers" may operate in a mutually concurrent way while n Writers" require ezclusive access to the object. Two solutions are presented based on the use of replicated versions of the data object. The first algorithm solves a potential starvation problem persistent in previously reported solutions, while the second eliminates synchronization requirements between 'Readers" and JJ Writers" by incorporating an optimized retry mechanism.

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