foo!(bar) ==> foo{bar} ==> foo[bar] (just Brackets)

[Bruno Medeiros]

Jason House wrote:
> Bruno Medeiros wrote:
> 
>> Don wrote:
>>> Denis Koroskin wrote:
>>>> On Wed, 08 Oct 2008 18:22:21 +0400, superdan <super at dan.org> wrote:
>>>>
>>>>> Walter Bright Wrote:
>>>>>
>>>>>> Dee Girl wrote:
>>>>>>> I did not follow this group recent. School started. Sorry! I just
>>>>>>> see now and please add my vote if possible. I start with D recent
>>>>>>> and I remember beginning. foo!(bar) was not pleasant. Like forced
>>>>>>> convention with a bad char. And friends I show code never like it.
>>>>>>> It is first thing they say why they do not like D. For me foo{bar}
>>>>>>> better idea. Thank you, Dee Girl
>>>>>> What do your friends think of { } ?
>>>>> School started. Every one so busy now. But I think does not matter
>>>>> any more ^_^
>>>>>
>>>>> I want to make little idea. Sorry if idea mentioned before (I did not
>>>>> read every thread). I think we can look square brackets []. Let me
>>>>> explain why.
>>>>>
>>>>> Paren () is over used in C and in D. Any expression can be in (). And
>>>>> adding () is possible in many cases. But it is not same with []. For
>>>>> example a:(b) is ambiguous but a:[b] is not. So there are many signs
>>>>> possible after symbol and before [. They are:
>>>>>
>>>>> ~ ! @ # $ % ^ & * - + = | \ / , < . > ? :
>>> Not all of them work. Here's a few examples:
>>>
>>>     enum { d= 3, e = 7 }
>>>     int [] a=[1,2];
>>>     bool c;
>>>     auto k=[e]; // kills =
>>>     a ~= c?[d]:[e]; // kills ?
>>>     int [] f = c?k:[e]; // kills :
>>>     if (f>[e]) {}   // kills <
>>>     if (f<[e]) {}   // kills >
>>>     auto g = (k,[d]); // kills comma
>>>     auto h = k~[d]; // kills ~
>>>
>>> Array ops will kill + - * / & | % ^
>>> Suddenly the list looks pretty short.
>>> !@#$\.
>>
>> Hum, what about brackets without any prefix character at all?
>>
>>    Vector[int, 2] foo;
>>    List[Vector[int, 2]] bar;
>>    int[3] a = [1, 2, 3]; // array literal here
>>    int[int] map;
>>    alias DenseMatrix[num] PulType;
>>    alias SparseRowsMatrix[num, HashSparseVector] PuuType;
>>    alias BiMap[uint, Tuple[uint, uint], BiMapOptions.lhDense] DicType;
>>    int var = a[2]; // array indexing here
>>
>> Hum... doesn't look bad visually. In fact it seems to fit quite nice
>> with how associative arrays, and even normal arrays, are declared. Hum,
>> yes, I'm personally liking this a lot.
>>
>> But does it have any ambiguities? Hum, can't think of any off-hand. If
>> an identifier appears before a bracket list, it could either be a
>> template instantiation, or an array indexation. But the syntax of both
>> is the same, so it doesn't need to be distinguished in the parser.
>>
>> Waddya think, was this discussed before?
>>
> 
> 
> It may be easy to parse, but it isn't easy to read.
> 
> What is goban[19]?  Is it an array or a template?  I'd hate to be reading
> through somebody else's code and have to decipher what things mean.

I give the same answer I gave to Bill:

True, you'd have to follow /goban/ to find out. But that is just a hover 
of the mouse away. :)


Just for the record, I'm also not bothered by !(), but if some people 
really find the urge to change it, I'd much rather have brackets than 
the ugly sad pirate. I say ugly because the dot is much more common than 
the '!', and for me it has a more solidified meaning of accessing 
members, so seeing it used as part of the template instantiation syntax 
looks weird.

-- 
Bruno Medeiros - Software Developer, MSc. in CS/E graduate
http://www.prowiki.org/wiki4d/wiki.cgi?BrunoMedeiros#D