✔ How to use 'a' syntax · beginners

I was wondering where the single quote syntax might be useful. I have read through the String discussions and the consensus seems to be, that the Unicode will be a separate package. My question is then why is 'a' in the language. Could we switch to a more python like approach (unicode.Scalar.from "a" or python's ord()).

Alex Nuttall (Mar 07 2024 at 14:02):

startsWithS = \str ->
    when Str.toUtf8 str is
        ['s', ..] -> Bool.true
        _ -> Bool.false

Adrian (Mar 07 2024 at 14:31):

that pattern breaks if you want to pattern match on Unicode strings :(
'Š' -> cant be made to U8

Richard Feldman (Mar 07 2024 at 14:58):

out of curiosity, have you run into a situation where you want to pattern match on something outside the ASCII range like 'Š'?

Adrian (Mar 07 2024 at 15:22):

Honestly, haven't pattern matched, tho words like "Živijo" are quite common in my language. I did run into a scenario, where I wanted to implement a parser. In that case I couldn't take just the first u8 and leave the rest as Str, since that would cause utf8 error.

Richard Feldman (Mar 07 2024 at 15:56):

Adrian (Mar 07 2024 at 16:42):

My point being, if 'a' isn't useful outside the unicode library, why not move it there?

Adrian (Mar 07 2024 at 16:45):

The other sensible thing I would recommmend is including enough of the unicode library under Str, that it would make sense, to use single quotes.

Richard Feldman (Mar 07 2024 at 16:47):

we introduced it specifically because people wanted to parse ASCII U8s using pattern matching

Richard Feldman (Mar 07 2024 at 16:48):

previously the only way to do that was using numbers, and then you had to separately document somehow what the actual character you wanted to parse was

Richard Feldman (Mar 07 2024 at 16:49):

so if we removed it from the language, that scenario would once again be painful and there would be immediate demand for re-adding it to the language

Richard Feldman (Mar 07 2024 at 16:50):

we've talked about giving an error if you put anything outside the ASCII range in single quotes, which would make it strictly less useful than today, but would make it more obvious what its primary motivating use case is

Adrian (Mar 07 2024 at 16:51):

when x is
    (ord "a") -> Ok {}
     _ -> Err {}

Stream: beginners

Topic: ✔ How to use 'a' syntax

Adrian (Mar 07 2024 at 12:44):