Re: [Lush-users] psu-lush 1.3 pre-release

[Ralf J. <jue...@cs...>]

I found that a few files were missing in the tarball.
This is fixed in this one,
ftp://ftp.cs.pdx.edu/pub/psu-lush/psu-lush-1.3pre5.tar.gz
I also got around to adding documentation for some new
features that I want to point to you:


* Default constructors

   User defined classes inherit the constructor of the
   superclass as a default constructor. Of course, you are
   free to override this default by providing your own
   definition. Example:

   (defclass A object i)
   (defmethod A A (j)
     (setq i j) )
   (defclass B A)

   (new B 15)


* Class namespaces

   Every class has an associated namespace. It is empty
   unless you put something in it. The names in a class
   namespace are visible in method definitions (when
   <defmethod> is evaluated, that is). This is useful
   for defining auxiliary functions or macros that you
   only need in the implementation of a class.
   Example:

   (defclass A object s)

   (in-namespace (class A)
   (defalias ++ concat)
   )

   (defmethod A A (u)
     (setq s (++ u u u)) )


* Template classes

   "Template" as in "generic programming". See the
   online documentation for an example.
   This is not a well designed language facility as C++
   templates, of course. This is a hack. But I'm hoping
   we will be able to improve it or develop something
   better in the future.
   I needed something like this for a library of
   abstract datatypes that I started writing. For a more
   complex example take a look at the set datatypes.
   (libload "datatypes/int-set") etc.


Ralf