From mboxrd@z Thu Jan 1 00:00:00 1970 Path: news.gmane.org!.POSTED.blaine.gmane.org!not-for-mail From: Ken Olum Newsgroups: gmane.emacs.devel Subject: Re: Improving aesthetics & readability of backquote Date: Mon, 20 May 2019 12:08:22 -0400 Message-ID: References: Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain Injection-Info: blaine.gmane.org; posting-host="blaine.gmane.org:195.159.176.226"; logging-data="103684"; mail-complaints-to="usenet@blaine.gmane.org" To: emacs-devel@gnu.org Original-X-From: emacs-devel-bounces+ged-emacs-devel=m.gmane.org@gnu.org Mon May 20 18:08:38 2019 Return-path: Envelope-to: ged-emacs-devel@m.gmane.org Original-Received: from lists.gnu.org ([209.51.188.17]) by blaine.gmane.org with esmtps (TLS1.0:RSA_AES_256_CBC_SHA1:256) (Exim 4.89) (envelope-from ) id 1hSkq5-000QoB-HQ for ged-emacs-devel@m.gmane.org; Mon, 20 May 2019 18:08:37 +0200 Original-Received: from localhost ([127.0.0.1]:37931 helo=lists.gnu.org) by lists.gnu.org with esmtp (Exim 4.71) (envelope-from ) id 1hSkq4-00070Y-Hq for ged-emacs-devel@m.gmane.org; Mon, 20 May 2019 12:08:36 -0400 Original-Received: from eggs.gnu.org ([209.51.188.92]:37002) by lists.gnu.org with esmtp (Exim 4.71) (envelope-from ) id 1hSkpy-00070D-DQ for emacs-devel@gnu.org; Mon, 20 May 2019 12:08:31 -0400 Original-Received: from Debian-exim by eggs.gnu.org with spam-scanned (Exim 4.71) (envelope-from ) id 1hSkpx-0000xK-1Y for emacs-devel@gnu.org; Mon, 20 May 2019 12:08:30 -0400 Original-Received: from cosmos.phy.tufts.edu ([130.64.84.253]:50990) by eggs.gnu.org with esmtps (TLS1.0:DHE_RSA_AES_256_CBC_SHA1:32) (Exim 4.71) (envelope-from ) id 1hSkpw-0000w2-Ui for emacs-devel@gnu.org; Mon, 20 May 2019 12:08:28 -0400 Original-Received: from kdo by cosmos.phy.tufts.edu ([local]:local) with local id 1hSkpq-0006nD-U4 - Using Exim-4.90_1 (MandrivaLinux) MTA (return-path ); Mon, 20 May 2019 12:08:22 -0400 In-Reply-To: (hello@paulwrankin.com) X-detected-operating-system: by eggs.gnu.org: GNU/Linux 2.2.x-3.x [generic] X-Received-From: 130.64.84.253 X-BeenThere: emacs-devel@gnu.org X-Mailman-Version: 2.1.21 Precedence: list List-Id: "Emacs development discussions." List-Unsubscribe: , List-Archive: List-Post: List-Help: List-Subscribe: , Errors-To: emacs-devel-bounces+ged-emacs-devel=m.gmane.org@gnu.org Original-Sender: "Emacs-devel" Xref: news.gmane.org gmane.emacs.devel:236805 Archived-At: There is a Lisp standard. I think we should not get further from Common Lisp by inventing new syntax, especially for low-level functionality that isn't related to anything special about emacs. I think the advantage of ` and , is that they allow the code that the macro will produce to be clearly visible. Thus (defmacro 2+ (x) `(+ ,x 2)) looks a lot like (defun 2+ (x) (+ x 2)) These two definitions do something very similar in terms of the effect of the object being defined when it appears in code, so I think it's good that they look similar. (defmacro 2+ (x) (quoteval (+ (unquote x) 2))) puts the focus on the operation of the macro expanding function, rather than on the code that is generated, i.e., on how the macro works rather than what it does. I think it's better to see the resulting form more clearly. Ken