Import conflict resoultion

[Regan Heath]

On Sat, 15 Jul 2006 10:59:13 +0100, Bruno Medeiros  
<brunodomedeirosATgmail at SPAM.com> wrote:
> Jari-Matti Mäkelä wrote:
>> Bruno Medeiros wrote:
>>> Regan Heath wrote:
>>>> On Fri, 14 Jul 2006 08:29:59 +0300, Georg Wrede
>>>> <georg.wrede at nospam.org> wrote:
>>>> <snip>
>>>>> Out of these, I'd want #4 and #5 combined.
>>>>>
>>>>> Except that I don't understand the following:
>>>>>
>>>>>  > 5:
>>>>>  > Allow selective import of the exact symbol which is required.
>>>>>  > import std.string.find; //exact syntax may vary
>>>>>  >
>>>>>  > ..find(.. //calls std.string.find
>>>>>  >
>>>>>  > No symbols from std.string would be present in the "secondary
>>>>> namespace".
>>>>>  >
>>>>>  >
>>>>>  > Opinions/pros/cons on the various solutions
>>>>>  > -------------------------------------------
>>>>>  >
>>>>>  > 5:
>>>>>  >  - PRO,Solves the import conflict for the intended symbol.
>>>>>  >  - CON,Does NOT solve future symbol conflicts.
>>>>>
>>>>> It was stated that "No symbols from std.string would be present in
>>>>> the "secondary namespace". Therefore I don't understand the CON
>>>>> argument "Does NOT solve future symbol conflicts".
>>>> I guess it can be argued either way. #5 does avoid future symbol
>>>> collisions (from std.string) but only by virtue of importing no other
>>>> symbols. In other words the cost of avoiding a collision is not having
>>>> access to other symbols. So, when you do want more access you have to
>>>> specify each and every symbol. This solution is too micro-management
>>>> for my liking.
>>>>
>>> What do you mean "when you do want more access you have to specify each
>>> and every symbol"? You mean having to use FQN?
>>  When selectively importing you only have access to the symbols that are
>> listed in the import statement - not. If you want to import yet another
>> symbol, you have to explicitly add it to the imports - every time. But
>> when using #4, new accessible symbols are automagically imported to a
>> secondary namespace).
>>
>
> I didn't understand that "- not." in the first statement. I'm assuming  
> it wasn't supposed to be there.
>
> So, yes, with selective import you only have access to the symbols that  
> are listed in the import, but that is the same as #4's aliasing import:
>    import std.string str; //exact syntax may vary
> Here only the name 'str' is imported, if you want to import another  
> symbol, you also have to add another import. Isn't that so?

No. #4 "import std.string str;" imports _all_ the symbols from std.string  
into a namespace/prefix called "str". So, the difference is this:

import std.string str;
str.find();    // ok, calls std.string.find
str.tolower(); // ok, calls std.string.tolower

import std.string.find;
find();    // ok, calls std.string.find
tolower(); // error, std.string.tolower has not been imported.

Regan