Re: obarray

[Barry Margolin <barmar@alum.mit.edu>]

In article <87txeaxb4l.fsf@nl106-137-194.student.uu.se>,
 Emanuel Berg <embe8573@student.uu.se> wrote:

> Barry Margolin <barmar@alum.mit.edu> writes:
> 
> > uninterned-symbol is an interned symbol. Its *value*
> > is the symbol foo, which is not interned; foo
> > shouldn't show up in the function you wrote earlier
> > in the thread; unless you happen to have interned
> > some other symbol by that name -- it would probably
> > be clearer if I'd done:
> >
> > (setq uninterned-symbol (make-symbol
> > "something-you-have-never-typed"))
> 
> OK, get it, thank you.
> 
> > Now try your function and see if
> > something-you-have-never-typed shows up.
> >
> > The value of the symbol
> > something-you-have-never-typed would then be bar.
> 
> Is there a way to confirm this? How can I access a
> symbol's value, if the symbol isn't in the obarray? If
> it isn't in the obarray, where is it? Is there a buffer
> and/or "scope" (i.e. form or process) local/temporary
> object array or anything of the like?

You can access it the same way you can access the contents of arrays and 
lists -- by getting to it from some other variable (or cons cell or 
array element) that references it. That's what the variable 
uninterned-symbol is for.

(symbol-value uninterned-symbol) => bar

-- 
Barry Margolin, barmar@alum.mit.edu
Arlington, MA
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