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000024_icon-group-sender _Sat Jan 16 16:32:36 1993.msg
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Received: by cheltenham.cs.arizona.edu; Sat, 16 Jan 1993 20:44:22 MST
Date: Sat, 16 Jan 93 16:32:36 PST
From: alex@laguna.Metaphor.COM (Bob Alexander)
Message-Id: <9301170032.AA05630@laguna.Metaphor.COM>
To: icon-group@cs.arizona.edu
Subject: Re: entab/detab
Status: R
Errors-To: icon-group-errors@cs.arizona.edu
I use entab and detab quite a bit -- often the text I want to process
is entabbed, and often I want to entab my output.
Interestingly, those routines once *were* library routines (in a
slightly different form), and made it into the language somewhere
around version 6. Certainly they *could* be library routines, but this
sort of operations is way faster as a primitive than if it were written
in Icon. I personally don't feel that it clutters up the language.
It would be interesting to create a questionaire to determine which
features are rarely used. E.g. how often do you use string invocation,
or PDCOs, or run-time error conversion to failure?
I think an interesting (significant) project would be to create a
smaller but more extensible Icon. The "real" Icon would just be a
nucleus, and much of the functionality could be added using new
yet-to-be-conceived extensibility features. The extensibility
cabilities would include
(a) "easy" addition of new primitives written in C (whatever
that means -- maybe without relinking the interpreter, or
at least with changes limited to one module. Maybe dynamic
linking -- that seems to be a trend and is implemented in
popular platforms now.)
(b) addition of new facilities written in Icon without creating
name conflicts.
(c) overloading of existing functions (like copy()) and
operators to handle new data types.
Has anyone else out there had a similar fantasy? Then things like
entab, X-stuff, and maybe even string scanning could be "extensions".
-- Bob Alexander
Metaphor Computer Systems (415) 966-0751 alex@metaphor.com
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