[racket] testing in P4P

On 9/21/10 12:40 PM, Shriram Krishnamurthi wrote:
> Thanks for the feedback!
>
>> - I wish conditionals were lighter weight.
>>    Maybe cond: Q0, A0, ... else: An
>
> I expressly want the signposts for intermediate expressions.  It makes
> clearer what you're looking at -- a question or an answer.

Can I write cond as I like it as a macro in P4P?  If so, the issue goes 
away (for me).

>> Choices of names seem independent of surface syntax details, so why
>> should they change if we change those details?
>
> 1. Because names are part of surface syntax.
>
> 2. Because I'm also expermenting with the names.
>
> I want the overhead of testing to be as small as possible, and find
> "check-expect" pretty unwieldy.  In PLAI, I called it test.
>
> Purely by coincidence, in Bootstrap, Emmanuel called it TEST [sic],
> because young kids have bad typing skills so the more characters they
> have to write, the longer it takes and the more mistakes they make.
> If at some point Emmanuel experiments with P4P, I can be sure the
> FIRST thing he'll ask for is a test: construct for testing.

So maybe we should call it test in {B,I,A}SL?

>> And doesn't the use of `=' and `=?' keywords violate your
>> "Distinguishing Keywords" choice?   I would expect `=:' and `=?:' for
>> consistency.
>
> At some point I had text, which I seem to have lost, that says I made
> an exception for symbolic keywords.  Put differently, I can claim it's
> already in there in that the rule only applies to keyWORDS.
>
> Take examples.rkt, rename all the = to =: and =? to =?:, and look at
> it.  I really believe you'll agree it looks significantly uglier.

Agreed -- my issue was with the text.

David