Here is a proposal to make Smalltalk more
functional.
If a Block B is never assigned to any variable in
a Method M and B is not returned by M and B is evaluated
by M
then B should be inlined by the Compiler as a way
of allocating and assigning immutable local variables
which can be part of a more functional local style of
Smalltalk programming.
Functional is good. Look at Haskell Scala Java F#
Ocaml lisp etc which are all going functional. Look at
category theory which is the theory of function composition
and function combination. It is good to base programming
on math. Look at Smalltalk Traits which are state free.
Smalltalk can be more functional.
No value Activation should be done by ( B value.. )
in M at runtime but only immutable local variable
assignments followed by immutable variable accesses.
Here is an example of a local tail recursive function
using only immutable variables :
[ :recurse | recurse value: input value: recurse
] value:[ :input1 :recurse |
( input1 message1 )
ifTrue:[ input1 message2 ]
ifFalse:[
recurse value:( input1 message3 )
value: recurse ] ]
Category Theory for programmers by Bartosz Milewski
Thank you
Kjell E Godø
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