[Felix-language] review of brackets

[john s. <sk...@us...>]

Apart from in structs, unions, and function/procedure definitions,
here is a possibly incomplete catalogue:

	{ expr } --> function returning expr
	{ stmt; stmt; expr } -> function returning expr
	{ stmt; stmt; return expr; } -> function returning expr
	{ stmt; stmt; } --> procedure
	{ pattern : type | expr } --> set form

	( expr ) --> expr
	( expr, expr ) --> tuple
	(x=expr, y=expr) -> record
	struct {x = expr; y=expr; } -> record (deprecated)
        ( stmt; stmt; expr ) --> expr // means #{ stmt; stmt; expr }
	() --> unit tuple
	( var expr ) --> expr (eagerly evaluated, same as (let x = expr in x))


I am looking at some more short forms, such as

	if(x)stmt;
	while(x)stmt;

like C. It's not clear these will work, since they're ambiguous.
An alternative (from COBOL):

	if x perform stmt;
	while x perform stmt;

Note these are already allowed:

	if x call expr;
	if x goto label;
	if x return;
	cond ?? stmt;

I also kind of like:

	0..99 

meaning a subrange of int, inclusive, and ascending order. Hece

	for i in 0..99 do ...

but then, that's from Pascal, my training language (actually I learned
Fortran first, and then Compass Assembler ..)

Yep, I used Pascal for years, then C++, when it got multiple inheritance.
And I learned C after that :) [I don't count learning BCPL .. :]

--
john skaller
sk...@us...
http://felix-lang.org