It may also been pointed out that the GTK part of J7 is using GTK functions and there are a number of string utilities in GTK and if you look for string in the html documentation for J7 there are several GTK utilities available for strings.
If they are better I have no idea but at least they are there and it is not necessary foir J to do everything the environment can provide. 2011/10/31 Andrew Pennebaker <[email protected]> > Tracy, I completely agree: strings as sequences of characters are an > intuitive and highly manipulable data structure. One reason strings stand > out in C, Haskell, and Lisp is that they are easy to map over because their > interface (and often their underlying implementation) is an iterable > collection. In contrast, Erlang treats strings as if they weren't made of > letters at all but solid hunks of unsearchable data, and it needlessly > makes programming that much harder. > > Don, which information is more often relevant: that two strings are > lt/gt/eq, or which characters differ and which are the same? > > Side note: Could we give longer formal names for each short function (e.g., > numberToString =: > 'd' (8!:0))? It's incredibly hard to Google > documentation for functions succinctly named. > > Cheers, > > Andrew Pennebaker > www.yellosoft.us > > On Mon, Oct 31, 2011 at 12:23 AM, Tracy Harms <[email protected]> wrote: > > > Although Roger has already replied with strong example code that show how > > this task is readily accomplished, and comments that explain why the > > primary verbs have domains defined as they do, I'd like to add a bit > more. > > > > The term "string" is common among programmers because it is a technical > > term with particular meanings in many languages. There are, however, no > > strings in J. We often can work with it in a casual way, but at some > point > > expectations about strings are things that come from other > > languages--indeed, other language paradigms--and those expectations are > > likely to clash with the way text is handled in J. This also explains why > > "string" is missing as a term in J documentation. It not only is not a > > J-specific term, as a word it can invite confusion. > > > > More and more, when I want the likes of "strings" in J it is symbols that > > do the trick. Not always, but often enough for me to suggest that it may > be > > premature to evaluate how well J facilitates working with text if skill > > with symbols has not been developed. > > > > Finally, I have found that J has brought me to think of literals in the > > same way I think of numbers. There are, of course, many verbs for which > > literals fall outside the domain, but thinking of text as lists of > > characters allows me to approach text-manipulation problems in the same > way > > I approach number-manipulation problems. This kind of consistency is has > > been highly valued in the development of array languages. It does mean > that > > it is not so easy to do various things with text that, say, > > text-specialized languages make very easy to do. But it also means that > > what is easy to do with text is just as easy to do with every other > atomic > > type. > > > > I'd enjoy seeing more material about working with text in J, at every > skill > > level. Eventually I may be able to contribute some, myself. Perhaps this > > thread can initiate a conversation about which sorts of expanded > > documentation would be most beneficial? > > > > --Tracy Harms > > > > > > On Sun, Oct 30, 2011 at 10:35 PM, Alan Stebbens <[email protected]> > wrote: > > > > > I get sad when I see both expert and new J programmers working hard to > do > > > simple string comparisons. J makes working with strings harder than it > > > should to be. > > > ... > > > J can manage most (any?) programming tasks but common things like > > > comparing strings ought to be easy. > > > ... > > ---------------------------------------------------------------------- > > For information about J forums see http://www.jsoftware.com/forums.htm > > > ---------------------------------------------------------------------- > For information about J forums see http://www.jsoftware.com/forums.htm > -- Björn Helgason, Verkfræðingur Fornustekkum II 781 Hornafirði, t-póst: [email protected] gsm: +3546985532 twitter: @flugfiskur http://groups.google.com/group/J-Programming Tæknikunnátta höndlar hið flókna, sköpunargáfa er meistari einfaldleikans góður kennari getur stigið á tær án þess að glansinn fari af skónum /|_ .-----------------------------------. ,' .\ / | Með léttri lund verður | ,--' _,' | Dagurinn í dag | / / | Enn betri en gærdagurinn | ( -. | `-----------------------------------' | ) | (\_ _/) (`-. '--.) (='.'=) ♖♘♗♕♔♙ `. )----' (")_(") ☃☠ ---------------------------------------------------------------------- For information about J forums see http://www.jsoftware.com/forums.htm
