From: matz@... (Yukihiro Matsumoto)
Date: 2002-07-25T13:22:48+09:00
Subject: unifying nil and false (Re: [PATCH] object.c ruby.h)

Hi,

In message "Re: [PATCH] object.c ruby.h (fwd)"
    on 02/07/25, Dave Thomas <Dave@PragmaticProgrammer.com> writes:

|At the same time, I'm wondering if it would be possible to unify nil
|and false, so that they were both the same object?

"nil" and "false" are treated differently everywhere.  Unifying them
will cause serious compatibility problem.  For example, Thread#status
returns false for threads terminated normally, nil for threads
terminated with exceptions.  See ri Thread#status.  Also I've heard
they're used for three state logic (true - false - undefined).

So it's not easy to unify them.

							matz.