From mboxrd@z Thu Jan 1 00:00:00 1970 Path: news.gmane.org!not-for-mail From: Karl Fogel Newsgroups: gmane.emacs.devel Subject: Re: proposal to make null string handling more emacs-y Date: Tue, 24 Apr 2012 23:45:31 -0500 Message-ID: <87y5pkzafo.fsf@floss.red-bean.com> References: Reply-To: Karl Fogel NNTP-Posting-Host: plane.gmane.org Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset=utf-8 Content-Transfer-Encoding: quoted-printable X-Trace: dough.gmane.org 1335329148 29639 80.91.229.3 (25 Apr 2012 04:45:48 GMT) X-Complaints-To: usenet@dough.gmane.org NNTP-Posting-Date: Wed, 25 Apr 2012 04:45:48 +0000 (UTC) Cc: emacs-devel@gnu.org To: Steve Yegge Original-X-From: emacs-devel-bounces+ged-emacs-devel=m.gmane.org@gnu.org Wed Apr 25 06:45:47 2012 Return-path: Envelope-to: ged-emacs-devel@m.gmane.org Original-Received: from lists.gnu.org ([208.118.235.17]) by plane.gmane.org with esmtp (Exim 4.69) (envelope-from ) id 1SMu6p-0006UH-CS for ged-emacs-devel@m.gmane.org; Wed, 25 Apr 2012 06:45:43 +0200 Original-Received: from localhost ([::1]:58227 helo=lists.gnu.org) by lists.gnu.org with esmtp (Exim 4.71) (envelope-from ) id 1SMu6o-0002Qd-Kh for ged-emacs-devel@m.gmane.org; Wed, 25 Apr 2012 00:45:42 -0400 Original-Received: from eggs.gnu.org ([208.118.235.92]:41189) by lists.gnu.org with esmtp (Exim 4.71) (envelope-from ) id 1SMu6k-0002QL-O1 for emacs-devel@gnu.org; Wed, 25 Apr 2012 00:45:39 -0400 Original-Received: from Debian-exim by eggs.gnu.org with spam-scanned (Exim 4.71) (envelope-from ) id 1SMu6j-0001rV-28 for emacs-devel@gnu.org; Wed, 25 Apr 2012 00:45:38 -0400 Original-Received: from mail-gy0-f169.google.com ([209.85.160.169]:61163) by eggs.gnu.org with esmtp (Exim 4.71) (envelope-from ) id 1SMu6i-0001rD-Qv for emacs-devel@gnu.org; Wed, 25 Apr 2012 00:45:36 -0400 Original-Received: by ghrr18 with SMTP id r18so1090028ghr.0 for ; Tue, 24 Apr 2012 21:45:34 -0700 (PDT) DKIM-Signature: v=1; a=rsa-sha256; c=relaxed/relaxed; d=gmail.com; s=20120113; h=sender:from:to:cc:subject:references:reply-to:date:in-reply-to :message-id:user-agent:mime-version:content-type :content-transfer-encoding; bh=rdMGckAG+dnrANwO6MpNcuhx9wiw3PCDyX1FMECzDUo=; b=Pa5iotIbQIysKPpjeBs8a6GAYW41J+fP+YrVRyZzD0Vaz0xwUu1i9WA7oajv7iGEep +w1WKOgyrpEtXNtBqvGJMxlmH+wGGJpNbRQgoAKD8Su3ZTO4fGSLzkomBPeL6vmH7rKu SOgdT74JoLgs/9SdDbuu9o/iS1XSNgl4EEYcQcBQwhsFrwNBo1ZcCpOMc7SGYUkh3EoW /FhCaNyjyeXYO3iTXdGVzyb102szTmGY8r2LW/ehb669a2mfcA+47xnEL1jdKuyJGsiL QkqQo6RP8p66MG1CJbVjV/UV1QPgbnPFbsJ5uymBtKe8O1do1OOhsg8BlMgveKomUAMe ZFgg== Original-Received: by 10.101.130.20 with SMTP id h20mr289538ann.58.1335329134194; Tue, 24 Apr 2012 21:45:34 -0700 (PDT) Original-Received: from floss.red-bean.com (h-68-164-5-236.chcgilgm.dynamic.covad.net. [68.164.5.236]) by mx.google.com with ESMTPS id x68sm96536963yhi.19.2012.04.24.21.45.32 (version=TLSv1/SSLv3 cipher=OTHER); Tue, 24 Apr 2012 21:45:33 -0700 (PDT) In-Reply-To: (Steve Yegge's message of "Tue, 24 Apr 2012 17:24:57 -0700") User-Agent: Gnus/5.13 (Gnus v5.13) Emacs/24.1.50 (gnu/linux) X-detected-operating-system: by eggs.gnu.org: Genre and OS details not recognized. X-Received-From: 209.85.160.169 X-BeenThere: emacs-devel@gnu.org X-Mailman-Version: 2.1.14 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-bounces+ged-emacs-devel=m.gmane.org@gnu.org Xref: news.gmane.org gmane.emacs.devel:149978 Archived-At: Steve Yegge writes: >Before you reject the idea out of hand, I'd like to ask that you >consider carefully >what behavior would be most consistent with=C2=A0the rest of Emacs, and >would make >best use=C2=A0of existing debugging and diagnostic facilities. > >Compared to lexical scoping, this change is pretty minor. ;-) > >-steve > >p.s. (string=3D nil "") would still yield nil, of course. =C2=A0I'm propos= ing >that=C2=A0we treat nil >as the empty string, not the other way around. Have you tried making the change in a dev tree and seeing what the first things to break are? I'm not sold on the idea anyway, I have to admit -- that "wrong-type" error has been a valuable source of early bug detection for me many times -- but the above seems like a worthwhile experiment for those who like the proposal and want to investigate it. -K