[Python-Dev] Re: [Fwd: Discussion: Introducing new operators formatrix computation]

[Huaiyu Zhu]

On Fri, 14 Jul 2000, Fredrik Lundh wrote:
> > is written as "string" instead of ['s','t','r','i','n','g'].
> 
> huh?  Python doesn't have a character type (C, C++)

Likewise, matlab doesn't have a number type, only matrices.

Generalization from number to matrix is definitely a smaller step than
generalization from character to string.  Matrix is more suitable for a
builtin type than complex number is, because it is conceptually much
simpler.

The whole field of linear algebra is built on eight statements, two of them
can be derived from the other.  You can't even define all the concepts like
upper or lower case, white space, tab, symbol, character and number and
identifier and concatenation and so on in just eight statements, let alone
to state all the rules of text processing.

The issue arises because one generalization is more familiar to one group of
people but the other is to other people.  And people tend to regard what
they are not familiar with as "specific domain".

Huaiyu