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Re: Syntax of Extends?

To: "REALbasic Betas" <realbasic-betas at lists dot realsoftware dot com>
Subject: Re: Syntax of Extends?
From: Charles Yeomans <yeomans at desuetude dot com>
Date: Tue, 30 Sep 2003 15:21:28 -0400

On Tuesday, September 30, 2003, at 03:08 PM, Mike D. wrote:

Subject: Re: Syntax of Extends?
From: "Mars Saxman" <mars at realsoftware dot com>
Date: Tue, 30 Sep 2003 11:01:04 -0700

md03 at xochi dot com wrote:

 Do I need to overload the function with both extends and non-extends
 definitions?, i.e.

 Function Foo extends x() as double) as double
 Function Foo x() as double) as double

Yes, exactly.

I think why this seems odd to me is that many of the built-in functions are already overloaded, so I expected the Extends keyword to behave the same. E.g. with the Len() function, you can do either:
  n = s.len
  n = len(s)

So it might be nice to have that built in as the default syntax; i.e. when you use Extends, it automatically allows either syntax?

However, if you did that, there would be no way to prevent the second invocation if you really didn't want a user to do it that way...

The question becomes, which is more natural and flexible? Is there ever a case where you want to allow
  n = x.foo
but you have a compelling reason to prevent
  n = foo(x)


I think that the way it is now is clear.

Charles Yeomans


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