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From: libes@nbs-amrf.UUCP
Newsgroups: net.lang.c
Subject: Re: <- vs =.  Naming atoi().
Message-ID: <360@nbs-amrf.UUCP>
Date: Fri, 11-Jul-86 01:53:50 EDT
Article-I.D.: nbs-amrf.360
Posted: Fri Jul 11 01:53:50 1986
Date-Received: Sat, 12-Jul-86 08:45:32 EDT
References: <1954@brl-smoke.ARPA> <4824@sun.uucp>
Organization: National Bureau of Standards
Lines: 35

Ok, so we blew it by omitting a left arrow from ASCII.  How about
making the following legal:

	a <- 3;		/* assignment */
	if (a = 3) ...  /* test for equality */

Oh, sorry.  Can't screw with C.  D, maybe.

I'd also like to point out that we need a symbol to represent "to".
I really tired of seeing things like:

	atoi();
	foo_to_bar();
	foo_2_bar();
	Foo2Bar();
	a2z();

and all the permutations of these (all of which I see in code).
Let's make a standard on how to name "x to y" functions.  I'd opt
for something like

	a->b()

where -> is a single character in the character set.  (Hey, as long
as we're redesigning it for <- (not to mention all those
international characters)...)

Any better (god I hope so) suggestions.  This is really a topic of
vital importance (as I had to write one of these stupid functions
this morning and I was in a quandary as how to name it).

Please do not mail to me.  (I refuse to waste my time summarizing
responses on such a silly topic.)

Don Libes       {seismo,umcp-cs}!nbs-amrf!libes