On 10/31/18 1:48 PM, John Cowan wrote:
> My main comment on the literals pre-SRFI is that the notation is confusing and hard to read because it's too terse and too full of @ signs, which are large and ugly.  Here's my suggestion:
> ...
> Examples:
> ...
> #2u16:(1 3 4 6) ((1 2 3) (4 5 6) (7 8 9)): unsigned short matrix with dimensions [1:3, 4:6] so 3 x 3

> What do you think of this?

Well, the specification does describe existing art, as implemented in at least two active implementations.
I realize your proposal does not conflict with the prior art (i.e. an implementation can
support both syntaxes, and it is easy to disambiguate).  Still, I think any new "invention" needs to be
clearly better than existing art - and while I'm inclined to agree yours is slightly more readable,
I don't think it is enough of an improvement. It is also less concise, especially when lower bounds can be elided.
--
	--Per Bothner
xxxxxx@bothner.com   http://per.bothner.com/