From: Bob Hutchison <hutch@...>
Date: 2005-10-20T21:59:47+09:00
Subject: Re: Method annotation and anonymous functions


On Oct 20, 2005, at 7:47 AM, David A. Black wrote:

> Hi --
>
> On Thu, 20 Oct 2005, Jeff Wood wrote:
>
>
>> It's really a VERY cool idea.  I really hope it makes it in. I know
>> most people seem to hate adding a little punctuation ... but  
>> sometimes
>> it can be a good thing.

What punctuation has to be added? I like the way it is done in the  
example.

>>
>
> The thing is, I've spent literally years watching literally dozens and
> dozens of things being suggested, *all* of which involve new
> punctuation and all of which someone thinks are good ideas.  If even a
> tenth of them were adopted, Ruby would be about 90% of the way to
> being in the Perl bracket of punctuation intensity.
>
> I know it sounds strange, but I actually consider the clean line of
> Ruby a "feature" (albeit an optional one, as to its use :-) which
> counts for more than almost every RCR imaginable to me.

I agree about the syntax. The example that Tran provided doesn't  
require new syntax, it works, and it does something that I think is  
*very* useful. I'll reproduce his example here:

>>  class X
>>    def foo ; "foo" ; end
>>    ann :foo, :returns => String
>>  end
>>
>>  X.ann :foo, :log => true
>>
>>  X.ann.foo.returns  #=> String

This is simple and so unexpected, to me at least, that it seems  
brilliant (forget the :returns bit, it is irrelevant). I think I'm  
still not used to what can be done with the mixing of compilation and  
runtime in ruby.

I tried writing a toy implementation of this last night to see if  
it'll solve a problem that I'm going to have to deal with soon. I'm  
working on a system that automatically augments class definitions and  
this is a great way for a programmer to provide additional hints and  
fine-tuning control -- in fact, this opens up a lot of possibilities.  
The implementation I came up with requires that include/extend trick  
that Robert Klemme mentioned in the "class method aliasing" thread  
the other day, but still. I'll soon cheat and look at what nitro and  
facets did.

Cheers,
Bob

>
>
> David
>
> -- 
> David A. Black
> dblack@wobblini.net
>
>

----
Bob Hutchison          -- blogs at <http://www.recursive.ca/hutch/>
Recursive Design Inc.  -- <http://www.recursive.ca/>
Raconteur              -- <http://www.raconteur.info/>