@property needed or not needed?

[Regan Heath]

On Mon, 03 Dec 2012 04:02:15 -0000, Timon Gehr <timon.gehr at gmx.ch> wrote:

> On 12/02/2012 09:19 PM, Regan Heath wrote:
>> On Sun, 02 Dec 2012 18:47:26 -0000, Rob T <rob at ucora.com> wrote:
>>> If someone can honestly demonstrate a non-subjective reason why there
>>> must be a difference between function call and variable assignments,
>>> please show it. So far I've only seen arguments that boil down to "I
>>> don't like it".
>>
>> A variable assignment is in 99% of cases a simple operation.  A function
>> call is in 99% of cases a more complex operation.  Being able to
>> immediately "see" those costs is useful.  A language which allows you to
>> make variable assignments costly will be inherently harder to understand
>> in terms of cost, than a language which does not.
>>
>> R
>>
>
> Costs are understood by profiling and/or detailed analysis, not by  
> looking at trivial syntactic properties.

Exact costs, yes.  But syntactic properties can, and have historically  
also given a good indication of costs and this is useful.  Removing that,  
is less than useful and potentially surprising.

Compare that to what you gain from this change.. nothing useful that I can  
see.

Making variable assignments and function calls look the same buys you  
nothing, you're trying to make apples and oranges look like oranges and  
hide all the nice, useful, detail and distinction you get from having both  
assignments (oranges) and function calls (apples) and all that they imply.

R

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