a .= b;

On Monday, 30 December 2024 at 21:33:58 UTC, Basile B. wrote:

a .= b;

This . is prone to be ambiguity.

If you look long enough at some code you'll see patterns like

a = a.b;

this pattern strangely looks like binary assignment operators

a = a + b;

which can be rewritten as

a += b;

In the same fashion we could have

a .= b;

The point is to evaluate te left hand side only once.

If you look long enough at some code you'll see patterns like

a = a.b;

this pattern strangely looks like binary assignment operators

a = a + b;

which can be rewritten as

a += b;

In the same fashion we could have

a .= b;

The point is to evaluate te left hand side only once.

On Monday, 30 December 2024 at 21:33:58 UTC, Basile B. wrote:

a .= b;

It’s a nice idea but it doesn’t help with the similar and perhaps more commonly used pattern slice = slice[1..$]. Is there any way we could redesign the syntax so it works for any case of Identifier = Identifier Expression?

If you look long enough at some code you'll see patterns like

a = a.b;

this pattern strangely looks like binary assignment operators

a = a + b;

which can be rewritten as

a += b;

In the same fashion we could have

a .= b;

The point is to evaluate te left hand side only once.