Would such sigils need to be all uppercase or would an uppercase initial
letter be sufficient? I would think that `~Vec[…]` or `~Mat[…]` would be
more readable (and easier to type, eventually). I’m not sure whether
`~Sql[…]` or `~SQL[…]` would be better, but I think that would be good.
What about Unicode sigils like `~δ[…]` (lowercase delta) vs `~Δ[…]`? I
haven’t tried, but are those possible and would Unicode capitalization make
the difference?
Could I make a "multi-word" sigil by using underscores? `~Jet_Pack[…]`. (I
think…no, especially if we could use intercapping `~JetPack[…]`.)
I’m in favour of this, but would prefer initial casing as sufficient
indicator that multi-letters are allowed.
-a
On Sat, Mar 4, 2023 at 12:55 PM José Valim <jose.va...@dashbit.co> wrote:
> To be clear, I am not advocating for any change to the existing sigils.
> The main point is that uppercase sigils are more important than lowercase
> ones and that, even in _some_ cases you may want interpolation (which would
> warrant a lowercase sigil), having a different syntax for interpolation can
> be a plus. Look no further than ~H for an example of sigil where the
> interpolation syntax is different for several reasons!
>
> On Sat, Mar 4, 2023 at 5:53 PM Amos King - Binary Noggin <
> a...@binarynoggin.com> wrote:
>
>> I love this idea. Removing the ambiguity will help with adoption as new
>> developers to the language are less confused. It also allows infinite
>> sigils to be available without stepping on each other. I'm not suggesting a
>> jump on making sigils for everything.
>>
>> You made the subtle point of sigils possibly having a different
>> interpolation syntax. I like the side effect of reducing errors, but it
>> also creates another syntax to learn. I like languages requiring you to be
>> safer by default, but this isn't a security concern in many circumstances.
>>
>> ~D[#{year}-08-24]
>>
>> ~D[{{year}}-08-24]
>>
>> In the SQL case, it makes sense, but does it for something like Date?
>>
>> Changing the interpolation syntax saves a small class of errors in
>> specific circumstances but creates multiple ways to interpolate that lead
>> to confusion, IMO.
>>
>> Cheers,
>>
>> Amos King, CEO
>>
>> <https://twitter.com/binarynoggin>
>> <https://www.facebook.com/BinaryNoggin/>
>> <https://www.instagram.com/binarynoggin/>
>> <https://www.linkedin.com/company/binary-noggin>
>>
>> 573-263-2278 a...@binarynoggin.com
>> Book a meeting <https://calendly.com/amos-king>
>>
>>
>> On Sat, Mar 4, 2023 at 2:15 AM José Valim <jose.va...@dashbit.co> wrote:
>>
>>> Sigils in Elixir are currently limited to a single letter. We had many
>>> discussions in the past about allowing more letters but they were
>>> ultimately rejected because of lowercase sigils.
>>>
>>> The issue with multi-letter lowercase sigils is that:
>>>
>>> 1. they are ambiguous to humans
>>> 2. they are ambiguous to machines
>>> 3. they may have security implications
>>>
>>> For instance, I would say that sigils in Elixir have quite distinctive
>>> features:
>>>
>>> var = ~w"foo"
>>> var = ~w[bar]
>>>
>>> Tilde, a letter, and the content surrounded by terminators. However,
>>> given how most identifiers in the language are lowercase, I think using a
>>> multi-letter starts to become less clear. For example, imagine we supported
>>> a sigil named opts:
>>>
>>> var = ~opts[bar]
>>>
>>> That's awfully close to:
>>>
>>> var =~ opts[bar]
>>>
>>> Which would in fact be ambiguous at the parser level.
>>>
>>> The other aspect is that security recommendations suggest different
>>> interpolations to be used for different aspects. For example, imagine
>>> someone wants to implement a SQL query sigil that automatically escapes
>>> characters. Today, one could write this:
>>>
>>> ~q"""
>>> SELECT * FROM posts WHERE id = #{id}
>>> """
>>>
>>> And that would be safe! But the fact we are using interpolation means
>>> someone can simply forget the ~q at the front and write an _unsafe_ query.
>>> It would be much better if the interpolation is different altogether:
>>>
>>> ~SQL"""
>>> SELECT * FROM posts WHERE id = {{id}}
>>> """
>>>
>>> On one hand, it may feel inconsistent to have different ways to
>>> interpolate, but at the same time it is reasonable to use different
>>> mechanisms when different behaviours and security trade-offs are involved.
>>> Especially because #{...} typically means string conversion and that's not
>>> the case for SQL queries (it is simply parameter placement).
>>>
>>> With all of this in mind, the suggestion is to allow only multi-letter
>>> uppercase sigils. Most sigils are uppercase anyway:
>>>
>>> 1. Elixir defines 4 lowercase sigils (~r, ~s, ~w, and ~c) but 8
>>> uppercase ones (the four previous plus ~T, ~D, ~N, ~U for datetimes)
>>> 2. Nx uses ~V and ~M for vectors and matrices respectively
>>> 3. LiveView uses ~H, Surface uses ~F, and LiveView Native will need at
>>> least two uppercase sigils for Swift UI and Jetpack Compose
>>>
>>> Therefore, I would like to propose for multi-letter uppercase only
>>> sigils to be introduced and be, from now on, the recommendation for new
>>> libraries. This means we won't deprecate ~T, ~D, ~N, ~U in Elixir, but
>>> there is still time to rewrite ~V and ~M in Nx to ~VEC and ~MAT. LiveView
>>> and Surface can decide if they want to migrate or not, ~SF may be a better
>>> choice for the latter, but LiveView Native can choose to support, for
>>> example, between ~JETPACK or ~JC if it prefers an abbreviation.
>>>
>>> Looking forward to feedback,
>>>
>>>
>>>
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http://www.halostatue.ca/ • http://twitter.com/halostatue
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