> > If you, or the other people who are confused by syntax-case, can point > to the parts of the manual that confuse you, so we can clear them up, I > think we'd all appreciate it. > > Fundamentally, syntax-case shouldn't be harder to use than define-macro > 99% of the time, if you remember > As a little addendum to that topic, I just ran across Matthew Flatt's presentation of Racket macro system, http://www.infoq.com/presentations/racket, where he points to a quite good introduction to "define-syntax" macros by Greg Hendershott: http://www.greghendershott.com/fear-of-macros/ And now that my head is clearer on this regard, I think it is confusing to call them "syntax-case" macros, because "syntax-case" is rather auxiliary than essential for defining that sort of macro. The order of presentation in the manual resembles the one that Hendershott criticises, namely: first, the syntax-rules macros are presented, which are an epiphany once you comprehend them, and then syntax-case is presented as a different type of macro. However, syntax-case is only a pleasant way to destructure syntactic information passed to a transformer, and the same effect could be achieved without using it, by using some more explicit procedures like syntax->datum. (Furthermore, Hendershott explains more specifically how do the syntax objects differ from raw scheme forms). So I believe that at least placing a link to than explanation in the manual could be a great help for beginners. Best regards, M.