Question (more or less) about arrays

[Björnke von Gierke]

how should an array behave in an xtalk language? In my opinion it 
should try to anticipate the use people would want of it, as well as 
behaving the same every time (consistence). With that in mind, I would 
let an array accessed trough "put myArray" return the same as when one 
would do this:
combine myArray using (the linedelimiter) and (the itemdelimiter)
put myArray
split myArray using (the linedelimiter) and (the itemdelimiter)

So an array would basically give it's content, but remain an array. 
This of course would allow to get the myCustompropertyset of an object 
the same way.

If one want's to test whether something is an array one would need to 
do the same as today, namely test whether the keys of myArray is empty.

Maybe an addition to the "is a" for arrays would be nice too? And while 
we're at it where are the "is among the keys" and "is among the 
elements" tests?

Arrays are fun to improve :)
Björnke


On 03 Apr 2007, at 17:50, Dave wrote:

>
> On 3 Apr 2007, at 16:52, jbv wrote:
>
>>
>>
>> Richard Gaskin a *crit :
>>
>>>>
>>>> One option is to return the same thing as when using "the keys of 
>>>> var",
>>>> IOW the list of the keys of the array...
>>>
>>> How would one distinguish between an array and a non-array which
>>> contains any return-delimited list?
>>
>> Well, actually, my problem was to detect if a var was empty or not, no
>> matter if it was an array or a regular variable.
>> At least my proposition solves my original problem.
>>
>> As for your question, may be could there be a command named "the 
>> arrayNames"
>> that would list the variables containing arrays ?
>> Therefore we could use some simple test such as :
>>     if my var is not empty and my var is among the arrayNames
>>
>> I'm sure someone will come up with a better idea...
>
> Maybe it would be better to just add a "type" function?
>
> e.g. Something like:
>
> if revType(myVar) = "Array" then
> .............................
>
>
> All the Best
> Dave

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