[squeak-dev] keeping arrow for assignment operator

Bert Freudenberg bert at freudenbergs.de
Thu Mar 12 17:19:15 UTC 2009


On 12.03.2009, at 18:08, Joshua Gargus wrote:

> Juan Vuletich wrote:
>>
>>
>> There's not a real consensus in this area. Many people (me included)
>> really prefer the left arrow for assignment and will not accept  
>> others
>> to prevent us from doing so. Please don't promise that. Switch to :=
>> only if you want.
>
> I usually agree with what you write, but this is simply wrong.   
> There is
> not *unanimous* consensus that left-arrow should be deprecated, but  
> when
> has there ever been, in the Squeak community?  However, there is
> certainly a consensus.  You're free to use an old/modified Squeak that
> support underscore-assignment-rendered-as-an-arrow, but the community
> has clearly decided otherwise (please don't make me dig for  
> references,
> but I will if I have to).
>
> You shouldn't muddy the waters for Squeak newcomers who haven't
> experienced the history first-hand.  Underscore assignment is on the  
> way
> out.  Period.
>
> I like the look of the left-arrow myself, but there's no reason that a
> pretty-printer can't render it that way; unfortunately nobody has
> stepped up to make that a reality.  On the other hand, I look  
> forward to
> when underscore-assignment is not only deprecated, but completely
> disallowed, so that I can, for example, program OpenGL in Squeak using
> identical constant names (eg: GL_COLOR_BUFFER_BIT instead of
> GLColorBufferBit).
>
> Cheers,
> Josh


Well put.

- Bert -





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