Yes. This would be useful, and I have been thinking about adding it for many months.
Do you think it is better as:
thru ["a" | "b" | "c"]
The first match is the winner.
-Carl
At 1/6/00 11:04 PM +0100, you wrote:
>Hi,
>
>would it be usefull to have 'first available to parse? I just can't find
>example right now, but let's say I want to find something, but apply my
>rule according to what is found first, so we could have better tree of
>possibilities:
>
>parse str ["sometext" [thru "a" | thru "b" | thru "c"] to end]
>parse str ["sometext" first [thru "a" | thru "b" | thru "c"] to end]
>
>
>the problem is - with above rule - it doesn't matter, if "a" is found
>later than "b" or "c". The second and the third part of subrule have not
>equal rights to first part of subrule - "a". So I thought extending
>parse dialect by 'first could help here, as each OR could be applied
>from the same position, and the winner is an option with lower 'index?
>
>I can't find any practical usage right now, it just came to my mind :-)
>
>hmmm ...
>
>"I can't find any practical usage right now, it just came to my mind
>:-)"
>
>["I can" [thru "just" | thru "any" | to "now"] "practical" to end] ;
>will fail ...
>
>["I can" first [thru "just" | thru "any" | to "now"] "practical" to
>end] ; would not have to ...
>
>Or is it just work around for 'thru and 'to not accepting subrules?
>
>-pekr-
>
