For readers who are not well set to see past an error I made in my reply
to Mike:
I inaccurately referred to something as a "middle tine" (of a fork). In
fact what I was looking at were the left two tines of a fork I had not
recognized, which comprised the right barb of a hook.
Fully parenthesized, the correct reading is:
(=/ ((>/~) * (+/~)))
and the way I'd normally type it is:
(=/ >/~ * +/~)
In reply to Raul:
Thank you for your comments on the similarities between J and list
comprehension syntax. When I re-examined it with that in mind, I decided
that what Haskell gains by this special device is something J has as a
matter of course. While the close correspondence with standard math
notation is nice, it is isolated exception. The equivalent in J does not
read similarly, and so lacks (math) familiarity, but it has an advantage
of universality because in J the syntax remains consistent. The ability
to read these sorts of things in J comes with the ability to read J as a
whole -- and vice versa. And, I see what you mean about their being
unavoidable (once you look past differences in syntactic particulars).
In reply to Dan:
What a feast! Your focus on tacit adverb construction will give me some
enjoyable study time. In addition, I concede to your arguments on the
topic of readability.
--
Tracy
----------------------------------------------------------------------
For information about J forums see http://www.jsoftware.com/forums.htm
