Printing dots in single-line

[Jay O'Connor]

Paul Rubin wrote:

>"Rainer Deyke" <rainerd at eldwood.com> writes:
>  
>
>>Yes: the print statement is an abomination.  It is a special-case syntax for
>>a task that requires no special syntax, and will hopefully be deprecated in
>>the future, the sooner the better.
>>    
>>
>
>Are you kidding?  The example I keep asking about is the addition
>operator (+).  Why does anyone need to say 2+2 when they can say
>2-(-2)?  The addition operator is a special case syntax for the
>subtraction operator where none is needed.  Should we deprecate it?
>I'd rather say that a practical language needs to make concessions to
>the way users actually think.
>  
>


Well, okay then :)  Personally, print bothers me because there is no 
receiver.  As an OO developer, I'm used to thinking usually iin terms of 
"object.method" and the fact that print is just sorta this standalone 
thing out there with no receiver doesn't match the way I think.  
However, it's not really a function either as it doesn't use function 
syntax.  It's just sorta there. It really doesn't fit in with any of the 
basic idioms I use when thinking about developing software