[Cuis-dev] Language constructs

[Juan Vuletich]

On 5/1/2020 11:21 AM, ken.dickey--- via Cuis-dev wrote:
> On 2020-05-01 00:45, Erik Stel via Cuis-dev wrote:
>
>> Maybe I wasn't clear (because it was part of another topic, see 
>> below) or tread on a sensitive subject, but I'm still eager to hear 
>> the reasoning for having backticks (which are not in Squeak nor 
>> Pharo) from the simplicity point of view. Would anyone care to 
>> elaborate?
>>
>> I am also eager to know what others think about language constructs 
>> such as #(), {} and `` for daily usage. And I mean this in the sense 
>> 'Do you use these often? Could you live without them?'. I do 
>> understand how they can be used and what their meaning is ;-). And I 
>> can also lookup their current use in the default image, but that does 
>> not answer how you/we use them in our (application) code.
>
> Erik,
>
> I think that array literals are quite useful.  As we move toward 
> multi-core VMs, marking out constant data and using functional data 
> structures (e.g. ropes), lockless queueing, and so forth are  becoming 
> more important.  Also, more interactions with GPUs favors cheap copies 
> -- constants allow for that.  Simplifies the deep semantics.

WRT this, I think that _all_ literals should be immutable.

> Not sure of the `#history`.

Went in detail in another message.

> Oh, BTW, we should add something to the #syntax section of the Terse 
> Guide on :: ; `` et al.

:+1:

> Cheers,
> -KenD

Cheers,

-- 
Juan Vuletich
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