From: "David A. Black" <dblack@...>
Date: 2007-09-17T23:19:47+09:00
Subject: Re: Newbie help

Hi --

On Mon, 17 Sep 2007, David A. Black wrote:

> Hi --
>
> On Mon, 17 Sep 2007, 7stud -- wrote:
>
>> unknown wrote:
>>>> After editing that sentence a couple of times, I completely changed the
>>>> meaning into something quite confusing.  A symbol *always* refers to a
>>>> string.  That should read:
>>> 
>>> I'm not sure I'd put it that way. A symbol, like a string, can always
>>> be represented by characters, but I don't think a symbol actually
>>> refers to a string, any more than the string refers to the symbol. But
>>> I may be misunderstanding what you mean.
>>> 
>> 
>> Then where is the error in this diagram:
>> 
>> 
>> s1 = :hello
>> s2 = :hello
>> s3 = :hello
>>
>>    "hello"
>>       ^
>>       |
>>       |
>>   symbol_obj
>>   id:2545934
>>   ^   ^   ^
>>   |   |   |
>>   s1  s2  s3
>
> If the top arrow means that the symbol :hello contains a reference to
> a string "hello", in the same way that s1-3 are bound to references to
> :hello, then I would say that's the error.

Leaving aside the immediate value thing for the moment :-)


David

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