"lineAtOffset"?

[Geoff Canyon]

I knew there was the possibility that it was vague, so I threw it out there
without explanation to see -- and it's vague. I was definitely going for
interpretation 2. So my

item 4 of y matching "a*b"

would be the same as your

item 4 of y where it matches "a*b"

and whatever the syntax, if y were

"aloft,ahab,about,alob,atob,dog,a flub,ack,a bob,ask,a tomb"

would return "a flub"


On Thu, Oct 29, 2015 at 4:25 PM, Mark Waddingham <mark at livecode.com> wrote:

> On 2015-10-29 19:47, Geoff Canyon wrote:
>
>> How about:
>>
>> line 1 containing x in y
>> word 47 containing x in y
>> item -3 containing x in y
>>
>
> I must confess I'm not 100% sure of what these mean - I see two
> possibilities:
>
> 1) item Z containing x in y - is the first item after item Z which
> contains x where y is the string to search
>
> 2) item Z containing x in y - the Z'th item containing x where y is the
> string to search
>
> Interpretation (1) is equivalent to the originally proposed
> 'itemAtOffset'. (Okay so it was lineAtOffset, but mutatis mutandis).
>
> Interpretation (2) is something slightly different to what we have now and
> perhaps wouldn't easily fit (obviously) into a functional form.
>
> Adding an index allows for a natural english syntax, a clear result,
>> maximum flexibility, and pathological extension, i.e.:
>>
>> word -2 containing "i" in item 14 containing "test" in line 23 containing
>> "index"
>>
>
> Any non-function like syntax would allow stacking naturally as the result
> of the expression after the 'in' would be evaluated first, so actions
> further to left would evaluate on the substrings produced by those to the
> right (of the 'in').
>
> (Obviously function versions would stack to, but be nested rather than
> left to right).
>
> This syntax would make it easy to do a more detailed match:
>>
>> line 4 matching "a*b" in y
>>
>
> I've always quite liked the idea of:
>
>    item 4 of y where it matches "a*b"
>
> Indeed, that makes me think that you are thinking interpretation (2) above
> (please do correct me if I'm wrong).
>
> Actually, with a 'where' clause, Richard's itemAtOffset function would
> become:
>
>    the first item of y where it contains "a"
>
> In either case (where or containing) I'd be concerned that there is a lack
> of clarity of what 'item N ...' means.
>
>
> Warmest Regards,
>
> Mark.
>
> --
> Mark Waddingham ~ mark at livecode.com ~ http://www.livecode.com/
> LiveCode: Everyone can create apps
>
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