On Wed, 2004-04-14 at 12:24, Juerd wrote:
> chromatic skribis 2004-04-14 12:07 (-0700):
> > > I think %hash`key makes sense. But I'd like to find out if more people
> > > like this idea.
> > How do you request a hash slice with backticks?
> You don't. There are %foo<<foo bar>> and %foo{'foo', 'bar'} already and
> hash slices aren't used much at all.
That's exactly my objection to this idea. I think it goes too far to
make simple things simpler while making complex things impossible.
I really don't want to explain why there are two hash key access
mechanisms, one that only works for single keys that match a very
simplified regular expression and one that works for one or many hash
keys with no restrictions.
Simplicity is good, yes. Huffman coding is also good. But you have to
balance them with consistency of expression, usage, and semantics. I
don't think this proposal does the latter.
On the other hand, if you prod Luke Palmer, he can probably write a
macro to make this syntax work for you in under ten minutes and three
messages. In that case, it may not be a core feature, but you can have
it for very nearly free.
-- c
