Path: utzoo!utgpu!jarvis.csri.toronto.edu!rutgers!cs.utexas.edu!uunet!willett!ForthNet
From: ForthNet@willett.UUCP (ForthNet articles from GEnie)
Newsgroups: comp.lang.forth
Subject: ANS FORTH TECHNICAL COMMITTEE
Message-ID: <505.UUL1.3#5129@willett.UUCP>
Date: 18 Feb 90 23:42:19 GMT
Organization: Latest link in the ForthNet chain.  (Pgh, PA)
Lines: 31

Category 10,  Topic 2
Message 218       Sun Feb 18, 1990
L.ZETTEL                     at 14:48 EST
 
      Having discussed it with them, I can assure you that ANSI X3J14 is
  not particularly enthused over the name >COLROW either, but they had to
  call it *something*...  The function is important, because it ensures
  that portable code can manipulate the cursor.
      Naming Forth words is a delicate business.  Criteria that have been
  advanced over the years include: names should 1) be single English words
  2) be short 3) encode maximum information in their first three characters
  (with modern practice, this one may be on its way to becoming a dead issue)
  4) describe the effect they produce, not the manner of its production
  5) preempt a minimum of useful user vocabulary 6) be memorable.
  In addition, the committe now worries about the dead hand of history.  It
  would be better if 7) words in the new standard were not the same as widely
  used words with similar, but not identical, behavior.
      For any particular word the result is going to be a design compromise,
  because the criteria conflict.  >COLROW, besides being ugly, clobbers 1).
  It was advocated because of its compliance with 6) and 7), but I wonder
  about 6).  Most of the rival ideas, AT for instance, got whomped by 7).
  (I have personally liked AT and AT? as a working pair).
      POSITION pushes 2).  My informal favorite is CURSE, but that will
  no doubt have other problems.  POINT and MARK have trouble with 5).  At
  the moment my personal candidate is SPOT, as in the way golfers place
  their balls.
      Anybody out there got the ideal solution?
                                -LenZ-
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