On Feb 26, 2017, at 11:16 PM, stepharong <[email protected]> wrote:
I hate my mail client....
Apparently I wrote email to explain what I finally understood and it
never sent it nor archive it :(
So I will try to summarize it and take some time tomorrow to reexplain
it.
Now I understand why I got confused
printit is currently a function from
objects -> literals (this handles the self-evaluating objects) + (and
this is unfortunate non literals such as string objects by opposition
to literal strings)
It means that there ares case where we can have
object -> a string object (and not a literal) in that case we use the
string object as a mediocre "reference" to the object.
If we would have
printgraphics
we would have objects -> graphics and unknow objects would be
represented by a little blue square and clicking on it would bring
and object representation (inspectors or whatever)
Now how to we improve the situation. I have the impression that it
would be good to have instead of printOn: which is used to do too many
things.
- first printOn: should not be used for list/combo or any widgets (this
will avoid some friends I know to get interfaces with ' inside their
comboxchoice) but to use displayString
- second I would introduce
asLiteralOn:
which garantee that you cannot escape
this way printIt will only prints strings as literal strings and the
contract is clear.
objects -> literals (this handles the self-evaluating objects)
1
>>> 1
false
>>>
false
but
(Directory name: 'comics')
>>> 'comics'
{ 1 . Browser new}
>>> 'anArray with (1, a Browser')
now we can ask ourselves if
{ (Directory name: 'comics') }
>>>
{ 'comics' } I do not like it
or
>>> 'anArray with ( comics )
back to my confusion:
I was confused about the fact that I was hijacking the textual
representation
'comics' is not a directory but a string
now may be I should have return a storeOn: representation
or 'aDirectory (comics)'
and introduce displayString
'comics'
Probably that printOn: should not be used the way I did it.
but I do not know.
I think that this is a subtle domain and we should provide better
guidelines.
Do you understand my points?
What do you think?
Stef
