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[REBOL] Re: Is Rebol OO?

From: g:santilli:tiscalinet:it at: 12-Jan-2004 10:07

Hi Jason, On Sunday, January 11, 2004, 10:56:22 PM, you wrote: JC> I was not trolling. And I am certainly not against dialects. Simply stating JC> the situation as I see it - rebol dialects really have not been tested and JC> used my large numbers of people in complex apps, so we donlt know yet the JC> deeper implications of using them. How many scripts do you know that do NOT use any dialect? JC> One issue of dialects has come up here, is that while they can lead to sweet JC> short code, dialects are only as good as their documentation. Since one is That applies to any language, or library/API, or class, or whatever... I don't see it as a special disadvantage of dialects. JC> Python is perhaps the most balanced language where write-ability JC> read-ability. Python's named function arguments have much to do with this. Personally I don't see any real advantage in "named function arguments". That is, why don't you see people doing something like: nam-arg-func: func [spec code] [ use [spec' code'] [ code': code spec': context spec func [block] [ block: make spec' block do bind/copy code' in block 'self ] ] ]
>> f: nam-arg-func [a: 1 b: 2] [a + b] >> f []
== 3
>> f [a: 3]
== 5
>> f [a: 3 b: 5]
== 8 You can also have "default local" vars with a little variation, nam-arg-func: func [spec code] [ use [spec' code'] [ code': code spec': context spec func [block] [ make make spec' block code' ] ] ] It's almost a one liner... JC> With rebol dialects, success is a tradeoff between readability, JC> write-ability, documentation, name-space and learning curve. They're a great JC> idea, but not been around long enough to know how to use them best, grasp JC> the trade-offs. The concept of domain specific languages is not that new. Giving the power to use them to anyone is new, however. And of course if you're not a language designer you're probably going to feel a little lost. ;-) But anyone can become a language designer. :) JC> I look forwards to seeing copies of O'Reilly latest: "Rebol Dialects in a JC> Nutshell". JC> Then we'll know they really arrived! If you mean, how to implement a dialect, that's already easy enough. If you mean, how to design it, well, won't ever be an easy task , as any other design problem. Regards, Gabriele. -- Gabriele Santilli <[g--santilli--tiscalinet--it]> -- REBOL Programmer Amiga Group Italia sez. L'Aquila --- SOON: http://www.rebol.it/