On 31 August 2010 12:55, Nikodemus Siivola nikodemus@random-state.net wrote:
On 19 August 2010 22:04, Faré fahree@gmail.com wrote:
Exporting random internal utilities from ASDF is a terrible idea, IMO.
The utilities are not completely random. I use them, and other people use them.
People will use them, and then you will be oblidged to maintain them even when you decide that they're not what you wanted.
That's the whole point. I want to be able to (require :asdf) and then use (asdf:getenv ...) to configure things. Not have to reinvent merge-pathnames* or pathname-directory-pathname or split-string or truenamize. As for aif and appendf they were singled out before my time and I don't think there's anything wrong with them. Should I stop exporting them? Possibly. But why? I don't have a strong opinion.
They also pointlessly pollute the namespaces of clients who use ASDF.
One man's "pollution" is another man's "great stuff".
In any case, just as for any other package, if you (:use :ASDF) instead of using ASDF:... prefixed symbols or (:import-from :ASDF ...) them one by one, you accept that you'll get whichever symbols ASDF will export in the future. You get what you ask for, and ASDF will not stop changing just because of you.
(It doesn't personally bother me, but it just seems wrong on pretty much every level.)
I agree that namespace management in CL is wrong on pretty much every level.
[ François-René ÐVB Rideau | Reflection&Cybernethics | http://fare.tunes.org ] If the human mind were simple enough to understand, we'd be too simple to understand it. — Pat Bahn