On 31 Mar 2004, xxxxxx@autodrip.bloodandcoffee.net wrote:

> It's not quite as clear-cut as you make it seem.  Olin Shivers stuck
> with the convention because there were no inherent benefits _for_those_
> sorting_algorithms_.  However, there _are_ inherent benefits for
> _searching_ (and for a few sorting algorithms).

Olin planned to have versions of sort functions with suffix "3".
So, maybe the compromise could be the same for this SRFI-43:
to have both, vector-binary-search and vector-binary-search3

> > My other problem with three-way comparators is the fact that there
> > is no three-way boolean to represent their results; symbols and
> > -1, 0, 1 are equally bad in this respect, more so because of
> > lack of precedent (no standard Scheme function uses symbols
> > as flags or enumerated options).
> >
> > P.S. Symbols are actually worse than -1, 0, 1 because with
> > the latter, one can use, say, * as a substitute for three-way
> > boolean operations; with symbols all operations have to be
> > written explicitly.
>
> I'm sticking with negative, zero, and positive.  That convention is
> used all over the place, it's efficient, and it's convenient.

Agreed. (This was exactly Olin's reply to my (naive) proposal to use 3
symbols for representing comparison results.)

Greetings
Sven