ABSTRACT
Normally, there are two aspects to any data object in Fortran. First, there are the various attributes that describe what sort of object it is: its type, its name, its shape if it is an array, its length if it is a character string, and the other attributes that can be set by a type declaration statement (TDS). This set of details is sometimes known as the “descriptor” of the data. Second, there is the actual value of the object. When a data object is first declared, the data descriptor is fixed and memory space is set aside to hold the value of the data. If the TDS includes data initialization, that memory space will be filled with the initial data values immediately.
