String/Symbol equality

Maloney johnm at wdi.disney.com
Thu Sep 24 18:41:35 UTC 1998


This issue comes up periodically. The difference results from
the fact a Symbol wants equalit to mean "identical objects"
whereas a String wants it to mean "collection-like objects with
the same contents".

To my way of thinking, the receiving object really *should* get
to choose its own meaning for the "=" message, just as the
it can decide what "+" or any other message means.
Thus, although the asymmetry of "=" is surprising when you
first run into it, I think it ends of making perfect sense
when you think about it from the message passing perspective.

	-- John


>#size = 'size' ==> false
>'size' = #size ==> true
>
>Shouldn't they both return true?
>
>Symbol>>#= anObject
>        ^self == anObject
>
>Perhaps the previous method should be eliminated, and an identity shortcut
>should be added to the following.
>
>SequenceableCollection>>#= otherCollection
>        "Answer whether the species of the receiver is the same as
>        otherCollection's species, and the receiver's size is the same as
>        otherCollection's size, and each of the receiver's elements equal the
>        corresponding element of otherCollection."
>        | size |
>        self == anObject ifTrue: [^true]. "<- IDENTITY SHORTCUT"
>        (size _ self size) = otherCollection size ifFalse: [^false].
>        self species == otherCollection species ifFalse: [^false].
>        1 to: size do:
>                [:index |
>                (self at: index) = (otherCollection at: index) ifFalse:
>[^false]].
>        ^true
>
>--Maurice
>
>---------------------------------------------------------------------------
>  Maurice Rabb    773.281.6003    Stono Technologies, LLC    Chicago, USA





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