[plt-scheme] self-referential data structures

See http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Typedef

Self-reference has nothing to do with FP. It is all about  
understanding data from a "usage" perspective (what does it  
represent) as opposed to an "implementation" perspective (how does  
the machine do it -- who cares really if it does it right). Even a  
language that's close to the machine can be understood as having a  
data language in which one can formulate such data definitions. See  
the URL mentioned at the the beginning. -- Matthias

P.S. There is absolutely no need to use assignment statement for self- 
referential data definition, only for self-referential data (a piece  
of data is an element of a set that is defined by a data definition).





On Mar 5, 2009, at 2:25 PM, aditya shukla wrote:

> Chapper 9 of htdp describes lists which is a self-referential data  
> structure used to process data of arbitrary size.I was wondering  
> the concept of self-referential data structure limited to the  
> functional paradigm or we can use self-referential ds in imperative  
> languages to process data of arbitrary size.Someone please shed  
> some light on this concept.
>
>
>
> Aditya
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