Re: O(1) performance for insertions/deletions at the front of an Array/String

Yukihiro Matsumoto wrote:

> |> A character will be represented by a string that holds exactly one
> |> character byte sequence.  A Python Way.
> |
> |So "foo"[0][0][0][0][0][0][0][0][0][0][0][0][0][0][0][0][0][0][0][0] 
> |would be "f"?
> 
>  Yes.

After some thinking I must say that I like the idea. Especially since 
then .downcase, .upcase and possibly others (.whitespace?, .letter?, 
.digit?) would automatically work on both strings and characters.

One thing that might cause either inconsistency or the possibility of a 
speed-up might be returning a frozen one-character string. Frozen state 
in this case should not propagate so that "foo"[0] + "bar"[0] would 
produce an unfrozen "fb".

I'm not sure if it is worth the small special case -- after all there 
already is COW style buffer sharing.

Oh, and ?f is going to be considered an obsolete way of writing "f" in 
such a Ruby?

Thanks for sharing your insights!