Is @property implementable?

[Jonathan M Davis]

On Wednesday 02 March 2011 18:02:18 Michel Fortin wrote:
> On 2011-03-02 20:56:41 -0500, Jonathan M Davis <jmdavisProg at gmx.com> said:
> > I would argue that properties make no sense unless they have a "this"
> > parameter to work.
> 
> I would argue that properties make sense everywhere variables make
> sense. Why should they be restricted to classes and structs?

Because a property must be a property _of_ something. It's essentially an 
abstraction of a member variable. It allows you to use a function as if it were 
a member variable. That's its whole purpose.

What's a module/global variable a property of? The module? I really don't think 
that that makes sense. A module/global variable is not a member variable, and 
the use of mutable module/global variables is _not_ something which should be 
encouraged anyway. So, conceptually, it doesn't really make sense for a 
"property" to be on a module, and practically-speaking, I don't really see any 
benefit at all. Not to mention, if it adds a layer of ambiguity (as you've 
brought up), then it _really_ doesn't make sense to do that.

Regardless, I don't think that it makes any sense whatsoever for a property to 
be on anything other than a user-defined type or a type which is acting like one 
(like arrays or something called with UFCS). A property is an abstraction for a 
member variable, not just any type of variable.

- Jonathan M Davis