[Seaside-dev] Re: Seaside2.8a1-mb.487

[Bany, Michel]

> > I do not see #displayString as a conversion method but rather as a 
> > method that produces string representations of objects for the user 
> > interface, somehow similar to #printString. Also, using 
> #displayString 
> > is a little more than a convention. VW does not and cannot have 
> > #asString implemented in Object, therefore using  something 
> else than 
> > #asString for getting string representations of objects was an 
> > obligation in order to make Seaside portable, rather than a 
> > convention. See below the (nearly) complete story as to why Seaside 
> > uses #displayString.
> 
> So basically neither #displayString nor #asString will ever work.
> Which just means we will have to introduce our own method for 
> string conversion that is used by no other Smalltalk (or wait 
> for ANSI, *jk*). This doesn't really take me by surprise to 
> so I have a concrete
> proposal: #toString. Yes, it's Java-esque but this is good 
> thing since it means that we have no conflicts with existing dialects.

Again, #displayString is not intended as a string conversion method,
but as a method for displaying an object to the user interface. When
you need a string conversion method use #asString. When you need a
displayable string for an object use #displayString. Most of the time
the result will be the same, but the intentions are different.

So why no just accept the change I suggested to #asFilename: where
we do not want to display anything to the user interface and where
we clearly need to convert a selector Symbol to a String.

asFilename: aSelector 
	| dotIndex extension |
	dotIndex := self lastUpperCaseIndexIn: aSelector.
	dotIndex = 0
		ifTrue: [^ aSelector asString].
	extension := (aSelector last: aSelector size - dotIndex + 1)
asLowercase.
	^ (aSelector first: dotIndex - 1)
		, '.' , extension