Rob Cozens wrote:
The key thing to remember with this proposed addition is that it's
an ADDITION, and OPTION that one can CHOOSE to use if they like, or
not if they don't.
And if Pascal programmers want := does Rev support yet another
OPTION. And if you want VB syntax, do we add yet another OPTION?
Reductio ad absurdum can be amusing, sometimes even pursuasive, but
rarely truly helpful. While we've had many requests over many years for
what can in the 21st century rightly be called "common" assignment
notation, yours is the first and only post to suggest Pascal be
considered as well.
The proposed assignment OPTION is consistent with several dozen
languages, many of which are still actively growing a strong rate, as
opposed to Pascal which is the only one which uses Pascal-style
assignment and is in rapid decline today.
This common assignment notation has three other factors weighing in its
favor that Pascal notation doesn't:
- It's not nearly as obscure as Regex, which is already supported
- Moreover, it's already implemented in some contexts (when defining
script-local vars)
- Because it's already allowed in some contexts but not others,
the current inconsistent implementation introduces learnability
issues that would be corrected if it were allowed for all contexts;
alternatively I suppose they could remove the contexts supported
but that opens up a whole other can of backward-compatibility
worms.
I find it interesting that in the currently-supported contexts this
common notation hasn't generated argument or controversy, nor has the
existing support for Regex which is far less xTalk-like and far more
difficult to learn.
Most importantly, as Ken noted it appears little on this list affects
RunRev's implementations. They will or will not add support for common
assignment notation as they wish -- if they do, my only hope is that
those who find it offensive please not use it so it will have no effect
on them at all, any more than the current partial implementation has.
PS: FWIW, I was opposed to the adoption of this assignment notation when
it was first proposed several years ago, but after thinking about it and
weighing the pros and cons I've changed my position. Today I see many
upsides for convenience and evangelism, and no downsides for current or
future users.
--
Richard Gaskin
Fourth World Media Corporation
___________________________________________________________
[EMAIL PROTECTED] http://www.FourthWorld.com
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