Hi list, this is a copy of a proposal that I dumped into the
bugtracker as
http://code.google.com/p/pharo/issues/detail?id=1346.
An OrderedCollection returns a copy on #sortBy:, while an
ArrayedCollection returns a changed
self on #sort:. ArrayedCollection does understand #sortBy:, while
OrderedCollection does not
understand #sort:.
In VW and Squeak, OrderedCollection understands sort:, and it sorts
inline. I'd like to propose two
things
(1) Add sort: to OrderedCollection, LinkedList and Heap (all of them
understand at: put: since
this weekend.
and then
(2) remove sortBy:
I understand that point 2 might be controversial. I'd like to argue
for it as follows: the naming
sort vs. sortBy: is more than misleading, they appear to be synonyms,
but they really do different
things. The principle of the least surprise tells me that we should
not have such behavior in the
system.
I'd like to argue that we want to erase the possible source of
confusion, that is change sortBy:
such that it either does the same as sort: or goes away. I'd like to
leave #sort: the way it is
because at any rate, we need to have an in-place sort, so why not keep
the sort that sorts in-
place.
I'd argue it should go away, such that code that currently calls
sortBy: does not call a method
with changed semantics, which is difficult to debug. A DNU is easy to
debug: you just change it
to the now appropriate call.
For me the most reasonable options are these:
- rename #sortBy: to #copySortedBy:
- remove #sortBy:
Out of these, I'd vote for removing, since #copySortedBy: is not
really shorter than 'copy sort:'.
Cheers,
Niko
_______________________________________________
Pharo-project mailing list
[hidden email]
http://lists.gforge.inria.fr/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/pharo-project
Locked
