OpenEuphoria

Re: goto: it's conceded

• Posted by David Cuny <dcuny at lanset.com> Jun 01, 2008
• 691 views

On Tuesday 27 May 2008 6:37:57 pm Kat wrote:

> I just conceded to Derek that i cannot defend every possible use of "goto",
> and i cannot support to his standards the use of "goto".

Sorry for coming in late on the conversation, but please allow me to add my 
own grumpy two cents worth.

I can't see the harm of adding GOTO to Euphoria. It adds real value for some 
people, and it doesn't (as far as I know) harm anyone by adding it.

Of course, I'm assuming the reason for not having a GOTO isn't technical.

There's this odd idea that adding features to a language will cause it harm. 
This concept baffles me. Just because you can get by without a feature, or 
you can add a workaround to do without it, doesn't mean the language is 
better off without that feature.

Here's a feature I found in Python: an 'else' clause for loops. The 'else' is 
triggered if the loop is exited without a 'break' being encountered. For 
example:

	-- look for my name in a sequence
	for i = 0 to length(s)
		if equal( s[i], "my name") then
			printf("got a match")
			break
		end if
	else
		printf("no match found")
	end for

Although this is just syntactic sugar, it's really, really useful. But I can't 
see this ever getting implemented in Euphoria, because the language purity 
police will argue that you can do the same thing without the 'else' clause. 
Adding it would only bloat the language.

From my perspective, this need to keep Euphoria spartan creates a language 
which isn't any fun to use. When I'm looking to code a solution, I look for 
the tool that will allow me to get something done, not for the one that 
enforced the maximum amount of B&D pain.

To choose not to implement a feature because someone *might* misuse it, 
reminds me of the definition of a Puritain as being someone that worries that 
somewhere, someone might be having fun.

If the feature isn't going to do any damage to you, but will be truly useful 
for someone, how do you justify not implementing it?

OK, back to lurking.

-- David Cuny