Alternate declaration syntax

[Robert Fraser]

Hans W. Uhlig wrote:
> Ok, Posting to the main forum so it doesn't get lost in the const stuff.
> 
> Perhaps a slight variation to the C declaration might be in order, since 
> I know that multiple return values are wanted, a simple and readable 
> syntax for inheritance is needed (using : as an inheritor does not make 
> code more readable) try this out and see if it makes it clearer
> 
> <modifiers,...> <identifier> <properties,...> {...}
> 
> such that:
> const foo(const int, const double) §
>     throws barExtension §
>     returns const int, const float
> {
>     // ... code ...
> }
> 
> same for classes:
> 
> const class foo § extends bar {
>     const int x;
>     pure foo(const int, const double) § returns invariant string;
>     // ... more code ...
> }
> 
> (Note: § is used as a divider because no one uses it for anything in 
> programming and I didn't want to start an argument over : or | or ; or 
> any other punctuation being used elsewhere and being bad, quite possible 
> punctuation wouldn't be neccessary)
> 
> It looks like a hideous cross between java and visual basic but it is 
> clean, readable, simple to machine parse(I think) and descriptive. using 
> slightly longer keywords makes a language a little more verbose, but it 
> also makes it readable. if you want to use punctuation for everything 
> you get what happened to perl when someone got a little too creative
> 
> `$=`;$_=\%!;($_)=/(.)/;$==++$|;($.,$/,$,,$\,$",$;,$^,$#,$~,$*,$:,@%)=(
> $!=~/(.)(.).(.)(.)(.)(.)..(.)(.)(.)..(.)......(.)/,$"),$=++;$.++;$.++;
> $_++;$_++;($_,$\,$,)=($~.$"."$;$/$%[$?]$_$\$,$:$%[$?]",$"&$~,$#,);$,++
> ;$,++;$^|=$";`$_$\$,$/$:$;$~$*$%[$?]$.$~$*${#}$%[$?]$;$\$"$^$~$*.>&$=`

As for the post itself, I agree the return type should be at the end, 
but good luck convincing Walter of such. Also, D has no exception 
specifications ("throws" clauses) - nor do many other languages besides 
Java (it's considered something of a failed experiment...).

My suggestion for the syntax is to indeed use the colon but not a 
"returns" keyword since that's a lot of typing. If I were designing a 
language, it would look like:

const foo(int x, int y, int z) : int
{
}

Grammatically:

<modifiers> <identifier> "(" <parameters> ")" ":" <return type> "{" 
<statements> "}"