On Mon, 2002-07-15 at 11:29, Karl Glazebrook wrote:
> complex formulae. Imagine:
>
> @solution = (^-@b + sqrt(@b^**2 ^+ 4^*@a^*@c) ) ^/ (2^*@a);
>
> (or would it be ^sqrt() ?) - This looks like sendmail :-)
I would imagine that non-binary operators would simply have a hyper-form
(which could be provided as a module) such as:
hypersqrt(@x)
or perhaps
@x.^{sqrt()}
or something like that.
> What is wrong with using @a * @b - the only reason I can think is to
There's nothing really *wrong* with it. In fact, I see no reason that
they can't co-exist:
@a = @b * @c if @d == 2;
since making hyper-operation context sensitive seems a reasonable thing
to me.
> Why do we need to preserve @x as array length when you are proposing
> @x.length ?
This is one of the most common operations performed on arrays. It seems
like Perl6 should be hospitable in that respect.
> As instigator of PDL, I am very concerned. Clearly inbuilt vectorization
> and compact
> arrays in perl6 will make PDL obsolete. I have no problem with that. A
PDL does much more than that, but of course you know that :) I think a
Perl6 re-design of PDL will be much more streamlined, but still
essential.
> If I was forced to write vector code like this I *WILL* give up on perl,
> and resort to Numerical
> Python or IDL instead.
Sure, that's always an option. I think Perl has a lot going for it other
than the way vectorization happens, and with the ability to define your
own array behavior, you can pretty much do this however you want anyway.
