Wait, what? What is AliasSeq?

[H. S. Teoh via Digitalmars-d]

On Thu, Jul 16, 2015 at 04:05:17AM +0000, Mike via Digitalmars-d wrote:
> On Thursday, 16 July 2015 at 00:49:29 UTC, Mike wrote:
> 
> >So, my asbestos underwear is on, and I ask if there is any support
> >for the "CompileTimeEntityList".  I know it contains the 'L'-word, so
> >if you prefer consider "CompileTimeEntities".  If the length bothers
> >you, then consider "CTEList" (could also be interpreted as
> >Compile-time element list, I suppose).
> >
> 
> I suppose "CompileTimeTuple" or "CTTuple" would be fine too,
> especially if we prefer to think of tuples as heterogeneous lists.

"Tuple" was the original term used for this, and was also the term that
started the whole debate because people thought it implied something
that didn't fit in with how these things actually worked. It did not
help that Phobos also defines a "Tuple" type, with more "traditional"
tuple behaviour, that's based on this "TypeTuple" but different.
However, the names being so similar, people were confusing and
conflating the two, which led to all kinds of misunderstandings and
confusion.

If we're going to use any name with "Tuple" at all, we might as well
just admit defeat and go back to the original "TypeTuple" after all,
since nothing else seems to be any better.

I think any successful name is going to have to be outside the usual
suspects -- tuple, sequence, list, array, etc.. All of them have
connotations that don't apply to this thing, and all of them lead the
unwary to assume things about it that may not be correct. In fact,
"sequence" so far is probably the least evil of all the alternatives, if
only it weren't so long to spell out. I'm quite happy with AliasSeq, to
be honest, though some people hate gratuitous abbreviations. I think it
should just stay as AliasSeq, per Andrei's recent response.

But in any case, if people think AliasSeq is not good enough, then we
really have to think outside the box, because none of the usual
candidates are going to work. AliasBeads (that I jokingly suggested), or
AliasBraids, or ... various other silly names that kinda prove the point
that we'd better just stick with AliasSeq and call it a day, instead of
spending yet more time and energy on this long-dead horse.


T

-- 
That's not a bug; that's a feature!