From: "Stefan Reichör" <xsteve@riic.at>
Cc: emacs-devel@gnu.org, xemacs-design@xemacs.org
Subject: Re: Rationale for split-string?
Date: Thu, 17 Apr 2003 13:30:01 +0200 [thread overview]
Message-ID: <uvfxduzt2.fsf@riic.at> (raw)
In-Reply-To: <87brz57at2.fsf@tleepslib.sk.tsukuba.ac.jp> (Stephen J. Turnbull's message of "Thu, 17 Apr 2003 18:06:17 +0900")
On Thu, 17 Apr 2003, Stephen J. Turnbull said:
> What is the rationale for the specification of `split-string'?
>
> That is, in GNU Emacs
>
> ;; an often convenient abbreviation
> (split-string " data ")
> => ("data")
>
> ;; weird
> (split-string " data " " ")
> => ("" "data" "")
>
> ;; urk (think "gnumeric just-say-no.xls" "save as" "csv")
> (split-string ",,data,," ",")
> => ("" "data" "")
>
> emacs-version
> "21.2.2"
>
> In XEmacs currently we get
>
> ;; usually (delete "" (split-string " data ")) should do the
> ;; trick if you don't like this
> (split-string " data ")
> => ("" "data" "")
>
> ;; no less useful than what GNU Emacs returns
> (split-string " data " " ")
> => ("" "" "data" "" "")
>
> ;; I can't imagine wanting anything else
> (split-string ",,data,," ",")
> => ("" "" "data" "" "")
>
> For comparison, Python's `split' function behaves like XEmacs's
> `split-string'. Perl's `split' function by default removes all
> trailing null fields while preserving all leading null fields, but
> when invoked "split (/pattern/, string, -1)" behaves like XEmacs's
> `split-string'.
>
> I think it makes sense for GNU Emacs to adopt (return to?) the
> simpler, more consistent behavior, rather than have XEmacs sync to
> GNU Emacs. In particular, I think it's really unfortunate to force
> people who want to parse csv data and the like to write their own
> functions, while the `(delete "" (split-string ...))' idiom not
> only seems very natural to me, but it handles the second example
> better than GNU Emacs currently does. And while I'm sure there
> exist applications where trimming null fields at the ends but
> leaving them when surrounded by non-null ones make sense, I can't
> come up with one offhand. I suspect they're less common than either
> "remove all nulls" or "keep all nulls".
>
> I believe that (at least for third-party maintainers) this change
> should cause no problems, because we have had no complaints about
> the behavior from anyone. (We discovered the difference only when
> Ben started a sync, and the regression test sent up flares and
> alarums.)
I noticed the different behavior of the split-string function,
because I need to parse csv output from subversion. Now I need
different code for the two platforms.
I would welcome, if the GNU Emacs and XEmacs would have the same
split-string implementation.
Stefan.
next prev parent reply other threads:[~2003-04-17 11:30 UTC|newest]
Thread overview: 35+ messages / expand[flat|nested] mbox.gz Atom feed top
2003-04-17 9:06 Rationale for split-string? Stephen J. Turnbull
2003-04-17 11:30 ` Stefan Reichör [this message]
2003-04-18 1:54 ` Richard Stallman
2003-04-18 2:59 ` Steve Youngs
2003-04-17 17:44 ` Stefan Monnier
2003-04-17 19:32 ` Luc Teirlinck
2003-04-18 11:50 ` Stephen J. Turnbull
2003-04-18 14:17 ` Stefan Monnier
2003-04-19 8:18 ` Stephen J. Turnbull
2003-04-19 13:35 ` Richard Stallman
2003-04-19 4:14 ` Richard Stallman
2003-04-19 8:55 ` Stephen J. Turnbull
2003-04-21 0:59 ` Richard Stallman
2003-04-21 1:55 ` Luc Teirlinck
2003-04-21 10:58 ` Stephen J. Turnbull
2003-04-21 21:11 ` Luc Teirlinck
2003-04-21 23:43 ` Miles Bader
2003-04-22 3:26 ` Luc Teirlinck
2003-04-22 4:09 ` Jerry James
2003-04-22 8:15 ` Eli Zaretskii
2003-04-22 13:22 ` Stephen J. Turnbull
2003-04-22 14:38 ` Jerry James
2003-04-22 12:56 ` Luc Teirlinck
2003-04-22 14:56 ` Jerry James
2003-04-22 15:27 ` Luc Teirlinck
2003-04-22 13:19 ` Stephen J. Turnbull
2003-04-22 13:39 ` Miles Bader
2003-04-22 13:51 ` Luc Teirlinck
2003-04-22 16:26 ` Luc Teirlinck
2003-04-23 1:00 ` Richard Stallman
2003-04-23 4:09 ` Stephen J. Turnbull
2003-04-24 23:12 ` Richard Stallman
2003-05-20 1:55 ` Stephen J. Turnbull
2003-05-22 15:00 ` Kai Großjohann
-- strict thread matches above, loose matches on Subject: below --
2003-05-20 3:11 Bill Wohler
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