Dyalog APL did not assign function (and operator) meanings
to { and }. Instead, you can do the equivalent of
length=: {%:+/*:y}
To do the same in J we'd need (at the very least)
to find a pair of "enclosing" symbols. To get rid of
the quotes we'd need something stronger. (Special
parser rules.)
> ugly cannot be good
Beauty is in the eye of the beholder.
----- Original Message -----
From: Andrew Nikitin <[email protected]>
Date: Saturday, December 19, 2009 17:09
Subject: [Jprogramming] Tacit exercise
To: J programming <[email protected]>
>
> I think the reason that so many people dislike explicit
> definitions is because they are syntactically ugly. Multiline is
> only mildly ugly, but single line is a freak. Come on,
>
> length=:3 : '%: +/ *: y' ?
>
> Bleah. Clean, easy to read and still bleah.
>
> This and only this fuels myth of alleged superiority of purely
> tacit expressions.
> Because ugly cannot be good.
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