On Wed, 06 Oct 2010 23:04:35 -0700, Walter Bright wrote:

> There have been a couple of looong threads about tuples:
> 
> http://www.digitalmars.com/d/archives/digitalmars/D/
Reddit_why_aren_t_people_using_D_93528.html
> 
> http://www.digitalmars.com/d/archives/digitalmars/D/
Should_the_comma_operator_be_removed_in_D2_101321.html
> 
> A lot of it foundered on what the syntax for tuple literals should be. The top of the list is simply enclosing them in ( ). The problem with this is
> 
>   (expression)
> 
> Is that a parenthesized expression, or a tuple? This really matters, since (e)[0] means very different things for the two. Finally, I got to thinking, why not just make it a special case:
> 
> 
>   ( ) == tuple
>   (a) == parenthesized expression
>   (a,b) == tuple
>   (a,b,c) == tuple
>   (a,b,c,d) == tuple
> 
> etc.
> 
> No ambiguities! Only one special case. I submit this special case is rare, because who wants to define a function that returns a tuple of 1? Such will come about from generative programming, but:
> 
> (a,b,c)[0]
> 
> may be how the generative programming works, and that suggests:
> 
> (a,0)[0]
> 
> as how a user could generate a tuple of 1. Awkward, sure, but like I said, I think this would be rare.


--vote;

Personally, I don't think we should start adding a dedicated tuple syntax at this point.  There are so many things that are more important, and besides, I think the library tuples are pretty cool.  We should instead focus on making Tuple!(...) even better.

-Lars

Lars T. Kyllingstad:

> Personally, I don't think we should start adding a dedicated tuple syntax at this point.  There are so many things that are more important, and besides, I think the library tuples are pretty cool.  We should instead focus on making Tuple!(...) even better.

Tuples are a basic part of a language, they need to come before web tools, loggers, numeric libraries and so on. You build Phobos and all those things with a language. So if the language is better, you will work better.

From what I've seen so far in this thread the Tuple/Record library solution will be kept, but some built-in syntax sugar (unpacking, and maybe for the literals) helps in making tuple usage more handy and clean.

Bye,
bearophile

On Friday 08 October 2010 03:30:35 bearophile wrote:
> Lars T. Kyllingstad:
> > Personally, I don't think we should start adding a dedicated tuple syntax at this point.  There are so many things that are more important, and besides, I think the library tuples are pretty cool.  We should instead focus on making Tuple!(...) even better.
> 
> Tuples are a basic part of a language, they need to come before web tools, loggers, numeric libraries and so on. You build Phobos and all those things with a language. So if the language is better, you will work better.

Agreed. But that doesn't mean that library solution isn't the best solution.

- Jonathan M Davis

On Fri, 08 Oct 2010 06:30:35 -0400, bearophile wrote:

> Lars T. Kyllingstad:
> 
>> Personally, I don't think we should start adding a dedicated tuple syntax at this point.  There are so many things that are more important, and besides, I think the library tuples are pretty cool.  We should instead focus on making Tuple!(...) even better.
> 
> Tuples are a basic part of a language, they need to come before web tools, loggers, numeric libraries and so on. [...]

I know, and I agree that *if* it is decided that tuples should be added to the language, it has to happen now.  I just don't think it's necessary to do it at all.

-Lars

On 8/10/2010 9:30 PM, bearophile wrote:
> Lars T. Kyllingstad:
>
>> Personally, I don't think we should start adding a dedicated tuple syntax
>> at this point.  There are so many things that are more important, and
>> besides, I think the library tuples are pretty cool.  We should instead
>> focus on making Tuple!(...) even better.
>
> Tuples are a basic part of a language, they need to come before web tools, loggers, numeric libraries and so on. You build Phobos and all those things with a language. So if the language is better, you will work better.
>
>  From what I've seen so far in this thread the Tuple/Record library solution will be kept, but some built-in syntax sugar (unpacking, and maybe for the literals) helps in making tuple usage more handy and clean.

People responding on this thread still allude the basic question about
exactly a tuple is supposed to be.  This discussion is hitherto
pointless.

I think Andrei is in agreement .. here's the transcript
from earlier on in this thread.

Cheers
Justin Johansson


(prior transcript follows)

On 10/7/10 7:23 CDT, Justin Johansson wrote:
> On 7/10/2010 5:04 PM, Walter Bright wrote:
>> There have been a couple of looong threads about tuples:
>>
>> http://www.digitalmars.com/d/archives/digitalmars/D/Reddit_why_aren_t_people_using_D_93528.html
>>
>>
>> http://www.digitalmars.com/d/archives/digitalmars/D/Should_the_comma_operator_be_removed_in_D2_101321.html
>>
>>
>> A lot of it foundered on what the syntax for tuple literals should be.
>> The top of the list is simply enclosing them in ( ). The problem with
>> this is
>
> Walter, please define exactly what a tuple is as being, both
> in the context of your post and (presumably) in the D type system.
>
> Without a precise definition of exactly what a tuple is,
> your post will at best elucidate responses that also lack a
> precise understanding of a tuple is (supposed to be).
>
> There are already a number of responses to your post that focus
> on syntax and without any semantic foundation.

Wise words! It was exactly what I protested against. It discusses syntax without attacking any of the actual issues.

Andrei