[Cuis-dev] Naming conventions

[Juan Vuletich]

Hi Folks,

On 4/27/2020 12:52 PM, Luciano Notarfrancesco via Cuis-dev wrote:
> I also dislike prefixes a lot. But fortunately name clashes are less 
> common in Cuis because there are not as many classes as in Pharo. 
> Personally, I’d love to have namespaces, or have class names be local 
> to a package.

Ok, this got me thinking. So, what would it take to do just that?

We could make each package be a namespace. That means that classes that 
are defined in a package will not be globals. But, any package declaring 
a prerequisite would also behave as if in Python you did 'From package 
import *'. So, the compiler would know that it is compiling some code 
for some package, and it would try to find class names in all packages 
that were declared as prerequisites.

This would have the added benefit that the compiler would check for you 
that you actually declared prerequisites. Code not in a package would 
not have access to classes defined at any package.

Usually, there would be no need to specify namespaces when accessing 
'globals', even if they belong in a different package/namespace. Just 
declaring the prerequisites for your package just once, will do. The 
only case where explicit call for a namespace would be needed, is if you 
ask two prerequisites, they both define classes with the same name, and 
there is ambiguity. In such casses something like:
a := `Smalltalk@#PackageName1@#ClassName` new.
b := `Smalltalk@#PackageName2@#ClassName` new.
would work as expected. See that class resolution is done at compile 
time because of the use of backticks. So there's no performance penalty. 
Also, there's no new syntax!

If we add package names to the Smalltlak global namespace, then we could 
also do:
a := `PackageName1@#ClassName` new.
b := `PackageName2@#ClassName` new.

Again, this is only when the case is that you decided to depend on two 
different packages that happen to clash. So, you are already aware of 
the situation. This would never get in your way when good old Smalltalk 
would do!

There's some work to be done in Browsers and other tools, but I feel it 
is not too much...

Also note that I'd not include nested namespaces, just like we don't 
have nested packages. I'd also avoid having namespaces as a separate 
thing from packages. I'd have a single concept for both. So, it would be 
simpler than what is available in other Smalltalks that support namespaces.

Does this make sense? I am missing something?

Thanks,

-- 
Juan Vuletich
www.cuis-smalltalk.org
https://github.com/Cuis-Smalltalk/Cuis-Smalltalk-Dev
https://github.com/jvuletich
https://www.linkedin.com/in/juan-vuletich-75611b3
@JuanVuletich


>
> On Mon, 27 Apr 2020 at 10:46 PM, giorgio ferraris via Cuis-dev 
> <cuis-dev at lists.cuis.st <mailto:cuis-dev at lists.cuis.st>> wrote:
>
>     Hello,
>     prefixes have a long story, in use also on  VisualSmalltalk or
>     SmalltalkV long, long time ago. Not having namespaces on many
>     Smalltalk dialects makes prefix the only (ugly) solution.
>     The resulting names are horrible, I personally dislike it a lot,
>     but class' names clashing is something that could easily happens.
>
>     ciao
>
>     giorgio
>
>
>
>     On Mon, Apr 27, 2020 at 5:34 PM Erik Stel via Cuis-dev
>     <cuis-dev at lists.cuis.st <mailto:cuis-dev at lists.cuis.st>> wrote:
>
>         Hi Ken,
>
>         I think you just answered my question ;-).
>
>         It can indeed be a Pharo ’thing’. In Pharo (default image) you
>         have class names like ’ZnWebSocket’. It represents a WebSocket
>         and comes from the ‘Zinc’ framework. I think it coexisted with
>         WebSocket for some time (the later is no longer part of the
>         default Pharo image). Also ‘MCPackage’ is a package from
>         Monticello (the versioning system). A full name like
>         ‘MonticelloPackage’ would have solved that issue of name
>         conflict I suppose.
>
>         Regards,
>         Erik
>
>
>         > On 27 Apr 2020, at 17:13, ken.dickey at whidbey.com
>         <mailto:ken.dickey at whidbey.com> wrote:
>         >
>         > On 2020-04-27 07:28, Erik Stel via Cuis-dev wrote:
>         >> Hi,
>         >> Short question:
>         >> Also using Pharo, I’m used to creating classes with
>         prefixed names
>         >> because of possible name collisions. What is the Cuis take
>         on these
>         >> prefixes? I do not see any prefixes being used in the
>         >> packages/features I’m using at the moment.
>         >> Regards,
>         >> Erik
>         >
>         > Examples?
>         >
>         > What is the context?
>         >
>         > Not being a Pharo user, I have no idea what you are talking
>         about.
>         >
>         > Typically, one wants to use meaningful names in a way that
>         orients one and makes code reads like sentences.
>         >
>         > Note that the base Cuis image typically has between 500 and
>         600 classes.  The latest Pharo base image has over 9000
>         classes.  Perhaps the (pre)fix is for a Pharo problem..
>         >
>         > -KenD
>         >
>
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>
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