On Sat, 13 Nov 2004, Sam Steingold wrote: >> * Rahul Jain <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> [2004-11-13 13:11:54 -0500]: >> >> For some structures, you may store open streams to files in their >> slots. How is making a load form for that simple? Maybe you want to >> have MAKE-LOAD-FORM re-open the file with the same name when the >> structure is reloaded or maybe you want it to lookup the name from >> some configurable variable. Do you expect MAKE-LOAD-FORM-SAVING-SLOTS >> to figure this out by itself? > > this argument applies equally well to lists and vectors. > should lists and vectors be non-externalizable just because they may > contain open streams?
No. Lists or vectors which happen to contain open streams are not externalizable as literals because they contain open streams. However, it is possible to define semantics for user-defined structures (but not for built-in-types or structures in complete generality) to save literals which happen to have open streams in slots, if reasonable semantics can be defined by the programmer. The globally correct semantics cannot be done for lists or vectors. Christophe
