I'd be in favour of both .. and ... .
Regarding ... , I'd like to note that Matlab uses the same as line joiner
(see
https://www.mathworks.com/help/matlab/matlab_prog/continue-long-statements-on-multiple-lines.html),
and also turns everything after that into a comment (which is very handy).
This would let one also comment longer tacit verbs well, without any
extraneous NB.'s . Trivial example would be:
avg =: ...
+/ ... sum
% ... divided by
# ... count
Your first comment would be incompatible with the easy commenting (without
using NB.).
I don't like the .:. proposal, since it is more difficult to type different
characters instead of the same; I'd rather have ::: (could imagine them
looking like the holes for shoelaces, that can be used to tie together
lines)...
Jan-Pieter
On Sat, 1 Apr 2023, 11:26 Elijah Stone, <elro...@elronnd.net> wrote:
> Some time ago, Michal proposed that a line separator be added. I want to
> rekindle that discussion. The proposal was that .. behave like a line
> break
> when placed on a single line, such that e.g. {{ a=. y+y .. a }} 2 would do
> the
> obvious thing. Short, distinctive, and to the point.
>
> I also want to propose a line _joiner_, analogous to \ in shell or c: ...,
> placed at the beginning or end of a line should join it with the previous
> or
> next. Joining lines happens _after_ stripping comments, unlike the other
> languages I cited; the goal is to enable large, multi-line definitions
> with
> commentary for intermediate terms, without the need for pointless
> intermediate
> definitions.
>
> It might be objectionable to use such similar symbols for separators and
> joiners. But maybe it's not such a big deal. Two more ideas:
>
> 1. Could use the _same_ symbol for both, with its sense depending on where
> it's placed in a line.
>
> 2. Separator could be .:.; metaphor: a hill stops the interpreter in its
> tracks.
>
> I don't like 2 because the larger the separator is, the more annoying it
> is to
> use. Joiner can afford to be large, since it only comes into play if the
> rest
> of the line is sufficiently large.
>
> Anyway--thoughts? Comments? Suggestions?
>
> -E
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