[racket-dev] Quick poll

10 minutes ago, Shriram Krishnamurthi wrote:
> I'm confused.  Why aren't $1, etc. also identifiers?

Both are.


> > (define $1 1)
> > (define 50-cent (/ $1 2))
> > 50-cent  ;; which, as you know, is pronounced "fiffy"
> 0.5
> 
> Or are you asking, "Since I'm going to steal part of the identifier
> namespace anyway, would you prefer..."?

Roughly -- instead of stealing, it just defines the identifiers that
are not already bound.  So with the current ^ names, if you happen to
have ^ bound, you get only ^^, ^^^ etc.


> (If so I'd say just take both and thereby make it useful to people
> used to either convention.)

Good idea!  (Should have been obvious given the above, but somehow I
missed it.)

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