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Re: [Scheme-reports] Draft 3 Comments: Chapter 5



Hi Denis,

Thanks again for the detailed comments.

On Tue, Aug 2, 2011 at 3:00 AM, Denis Washington <denisw@x> wrote:
>
> 5.1. Programs
> =============
>
>  From what I can see, this is mostly R5RS (except for small adjustments
> to mention modules) and inherits a certain lack of preciseness from it.

This was very intentional - both the small deviation from R5RS and
the "lack of preciseness," which is another way of saying "flexibility."
The fact of the matter is that implementations differ greatly, implementors
like adding and experimenting with their own features, and the purpose
of the "small language" is to provide a minimum common ground on
which implementations can agree and still share useful code.

The "large language" and/or future standards can be used to
nail down the semantics when and if we get on the same page.

> Specifically, it is not really said what the mentioned "top level" of a
> program actually is (it is somewhat deducible from the context, but
> "somewhat deducible" isn't quite enough for a standards document IMO). I
> know I have pointed to R6RS more than enough in my last review message,
> but its section 8 ("Top-level Programs") might be helpful here.

This could possibly be disastrous for implementor uptake, since one
of the most common complaints against R6RS was its handling of
top-levels, and specifically its forbidding of REPLs.

[...]
> Rather than saying that the transformer should be a syntax-rules form,
> it might be preferable to say that it should be a macro transformer but
> that syntax-rules is the only one defined in this report.

Good point, we'll change this.

[...]
> The added paragraph regarding ambiguous definitions is very, very hard
> to understand; the sentences are not particularly well digestible. But I
> admit that it is very hard to explain. ;) A proposal:

Yes, the source has a TODO to revisit that paragraph.  We may
use your proposal, or try to come up with a simpler way to explain it.

-- 
Alex

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