On 12.12.2011 20:03, Jonathan M Davis wrote:
On Monday, December 12, 2011 09:16:53 Andrei Alexandrescu wrote:
On 12/12/11 9:09 AM, torhu wrote:
> On 12.12.2011 15:43, Andrei Alexandrescu wrote:
>> On 12/12/11 6:24 AM, torhu wrote:
>>> save being a property is a stupid inconsistency.
>>
>> I'm not so sure.
>>
>> Andrei
>
> Why? As far as I can tell, it's inconsistent with what properties are
> used like in other programming languages.
Why?
> Saving something is an action,
> which to me is a different concept.
So if we called .save .state or .current things would be any different?
> If it was called currentState
> instead, that's what I'd call a property.
Ah. So now we're wasting time not on @property (as I'd predicted), but
instead on what _names_ are suitable to work with it. I rest my case.
> Making something a property gives it certain connotations that break
> when it's called 'save'. That you can save the state of the range is a
> property, if you will. But the action of doing so is not a property.
> People are going to be surprised when save() doesn't compile. Isn't
> there something called the principle of least surprise?
I think we should only worry about surprising the uninitiated with how
poorly designed the whole @property thing is.
A property is essentially an abstraction to treat a function like a member
variable. As such, the naming conventions for a property should be equivalent
to those for a variable - and that generally means nouns. save is not a noun.
It's an action verb. So, yes, I think that it's a completely inappropriate
name for a property. Something ilke state or current _would_ be appropriate
names. However, at this point, I really don't think that it's worth arguing
about.
If I were to change it, I'd probably just make save a function rather than
renaming it, but if we did it, then there would be quite a bit of code that
would have to be changed essentially over an argument over whether save is
valid property name because it's not a noun. And while I _don't_ think that
it's a valid property name, that's getting a bit petty given how much code
would break.
It's actually not 'save' being a noun that's the problem. I just
thought of a counter-example:
---
struct Foo {
// the data
Bar data[];
// save data on shutdown?
@property bool save() { return save_; }
@property bool save(bool shouldShave) { return save_ = shouldSave; }
private:
bool save_;
}
---
Not meant to be a realistic example, but save is fine as a property here.
