Re: [Ocaml-lib-devel] Labelled interfaces

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

> I've noticed that ExtLib's replacements for the standard libraries
> (ExtString, ExtList, etc), don't replicate one (in my mind) important
> aspect of those libraries, which is the labelled versions of those
> interfaces.  I use the labelled versions almost exclusively, and would
> find ExtLib easier to use if similar interfaces existed there.
>
> So, are people open to patches that add in such an alternate interface?

ExtLib label policy is little different than OCaml stdlib one.
In OCaml, the std library is label-free and there is a label version of the
interfaces (with a pseudo module that is only including the unlabeled ones).
This is for historical reasons, since OLabels was a branch of the ocaml
compiler developped by Jacques Garrigue and merged later with a conservative
approach.

In ExtLib, labels are used when we feel they are useful : in order to
provide tips when a large number of arguments are available, or to
disambigous several arguments with the same type that could cause some user
confusion about the wanted order.

I'm not against having a labelled version of ExtLib, but I'm not sure it
should be maintened directly into the CVS. Reasons are that there is maybe
no big need for theses (you're actualy the first one asking for them) and it
takes actually quite a lot of time to maintain, especialy when the
interfaces of the modules are evolving quickly. Even if we accept a patch in
the first time, that will include quite a lot of future work of keeping
label headers up-to-date.

Regards,
Nicolas Cannasse