Re: [ANN] CHICKEN 5.4.0 release candidate 2 available

[felix . winkelmann]

> I also have a question about this line in the changelog: "Added support for
> embedded strings and characters in SRFI-4 vector".  this seems very neat!
> But why doesn't it also work in the runtime u8vector constructor? Srfi-4
> vector literals are limited in that they can contain only other literals,
> not arbitrary expressions so I tend to not use them.
>
> #;2> #u8(1 "hello")
> #u8(1 104 101 108 108 111)
> #;3> (u8vector 1 "hello")
> Error: (u8vector-set!) bad argument type: "hello"

Literals like vectors contain <datum>s, which are not arbitrary expressions,
this is just how the language is defined. In normal vectors allowing expressions
would create ambiguities, as a vector can contain any value. For bytevectors
one could argue that this situation does not exist, but I somehow find that
it gets confusing. So consider the string-notation in literals a convience 
feature,
nothing more. Generalizing this to the constructor procedure just invites type
errors and hides mistakes, I think.


felix