Re: [Ocaml-lib-devel] ExtLib v0.1o

[Nicolas C. <war...@fr...>]

> > keeping shortly named modules is helpful when reading problems as
> > it keeps the source code compact.
>
> I don't think I would ever agree that an overly shortened identifier
> makes reading code easier or more pleasant than a fully descriptive
> identifier (speaking generally, of course).
[...]
> Now then, the only argument so far against MutableList (or similar
> fully descriptive name) is that it is too long.
>
> answer 1:  Get an editor that supports keyboard macros or
> abbreviations.  At the very least, get one that supports find/replace.
>
> answer 2:  let mlBlah = MutableList.blah
>
> Now, before you point out that these arguments could both be used to
> support your position as well (well, half of answer 1 and all of
> answer 2), I would suggest that they lend more weight to the
> descriptive name argument.  This is because I believe that while a
> user should be free to make the language less descriptive for the sake
> of typing fewer characters, it should *not* be the user's
> responsibility to bring the language up to a basic level of
> readibility.  That responsibility should remain with the
> language/library developer.  (Hmmm...that thought was a lot harder to
> put into words than I figured it would be...I hope I got the point
> across).

Okay, I give up, MList was a bad name since the beginning :)
But I don't think that Mutable_List is good either.

Perhaps "MutList" ( without underscore ) match both needs :
1) descriptive enough
2) short enough

Do people here agree ?

I'm happy that we add theses talks, that will help a lot in future problems
containing modules/functions naming.
Let's put the two rules above somewhere.

Nicolas Cannasse