>Wasn't my point. I think the long form is clearer. One of the great<br>
>things about Smalltalk is the simple object+message syntax. Brace<br>
>notation is something else. It can be handy at times, but I think the<br>
>other form is clearer.<br><br>Yes, I agree, the first form is smaller, but to a causal observer, the second form makes more sense. I personally aim for readbility of my code, even by people that do not know the programming language, I would choose the second choice!<br>
<br><br><div class="gmail_quote">On Wed, May 14, 2008 at 5:07 PM, David Mitchell <<a href="mailto:david.mitchell@gmail.com">david.mitchell@gmail.com</a>> wrote:<br><blockquote class="gmail_quote" style="border-left: 1px solid rgb(204, 204, 204); margin: 0pt 0pt 0pt 0.8ex; padding-left: 1ex;">
<div class="Ih2E3d">> > But, if you are trying to write code that is portable across Smalltalk<br>
> > dialects, you avoid brace notation.<br>
><br>
> All dialects have a way to modify the parser don't they (probably a<br>
> really simple way in many of them)? Maybe an alternative would be to<br>
> just make a package that adds the syntax to any Smalltalk. Then<br>
> people could use it if the want and just site the package as a<br>
> dependancy.<br>
<br>
</div>I think modifying the parser is a pretty big expectation for an<br>
application or framework.<br>
<div class="Ih2E3d"><br>
><br>
> > As I think it would be easier to update. I use literal forms to save<br>
> > myself typing but when I commit code, I'd rather have the long form.<br>
> > In fact, I've sent #sourceString to literal arrays so I could get the<br>
> > long form without all the typing.<br>
><br>
> That is a good way of doing it, but the maintenance cost comes from<br>
> how much code is there, not how much was typed. This is a huge<br>
> problem Java has. Java wizards say "It doesn't matter how verbose the<br>
> syntax is, I just generate all the boilerplate". But that doesn't<br>
> help the guy maintaining the code very much.<br>
><br>
<br>
</div>Wasn't my point. I think the long form is clearer. One of the great<br>
things about Smalltalk is the simple object+message syntax. Brace<br>
notation is something else. It can be handy at times, but I think the<br>
other form is clearer.<br>
<br>
</blockquote></div><br><br clear="all"><br>-- <br>David Zmick<br>/dz0004455\<br><a href="http://dz0004455.googlepages.com">http://dz0004455.googlepages.com</a><br><a href="http://dz0004455.blogspot.com">http://dz0004455.blogspot.com</a>