Re: Comments on process template syntax

[zimoun]

Hi Ricardo

On Wed, 5 Feb 2020 at 19:04, Ricardo Wurmus <address@hidden> wrote:

> > Does it make sense to expand "process: proc arg" as "process : proc arg"?
> > Well, disallow the colon ':' in all the name (symbol) and then expand.
>
> This is not easily accomplished because “:” is a valid character in a
> symbol.  So I’d have to replace the reader to disallow “:” in symbols.
> That’s a very big intervention.

Ok.
It was just an idea. :-)


> > Because this space is a drawback of Wisp, I mean at least to me.
> > Especially coming from Python where the standard is to have "def
> > proc(arg):" and not "def proc(arg) :".
>
> I see what you mean.  The “:” on its own is just the Wisp way of saying
> “wrap the rest of this line in parentheses”.  In Haskell that’s “$”.  In
> both cases it’s separate from any identifiers.

The dollar '$' appears to me a better choice than the colon ':'.
Because the colon is used in plain English and often used elsewhere
without space (YAML, python, etc.). It is about habits.
Well, that's another story. :-)


> In the Python case the “:” serves no real purpose as far as I can tell.

Hum? The colon ':' serves as separator used by the parser, AFAIU.
I mean the colon ':' is part of the Python grammar.

https://docs.python.org/3/reference/grammar.html

Well, that's another story again. ;-)


> >>     process list-file-template (filename)
> >
> > I find this one the clearer.
>
> Unfortunately, this one is not possible due to ambiguity in the process
> macro as I explained in an earlier email.  We can avoid this ambiguity
> by adding “with” as extra syntax:

Sorry I unqueued my emails in order. :-)


>   process list-file-template (with filename)
>
> It’s not perfect, but I don’t see another way that would be any clearer.

I am fine with the 'with' keyword.

>   process list-file-template with this that anything whatever

As I said elsewhere, I am not bothered by the previous syntax.

And I find equivalently nice the both using 'with'; without or with parenthesis.


> I honestly can’t tell which of the options is better.  It’s like saying
> the word “table” 50 times in a row and wondering what these odd sounds
> really mean…

:-D


Aside, the 'process' macro should be renamed as Kyle mentioned it.
Because it is confusing, IMHO.


Thank you for all these new inputs on GWL.

Cheers,
simon