macros

[Jeff Shannon]

Jeremy Bowers wrote:

> On Tue, 18 Jan 2005 12:59:07 -0800, Robert Brewer wrote:
> 
> You know, Guido might as well give in now on the Macro issue. If he
> doesn't come up with something himself, apparently we'll just hack
> bytecode. I'm not sure that's a gain. 

I think that this sort of thing is better to have as an explicitly 
risky hack, than as an endorsed part of the language.  The mere fact 
that this *is* something that one can clearly tell is working around 
certain deliberate limitations is a big warning sign, and it makes it 
much less likely to be used extensively.  Relatively few people are 
going to want to use something called "bytecodehacks" in a 
mission-critical piece of software, compared to the number who'd be 
perfectly happy to use a language's built-in macro facilities, so at 
least it keeps the actual usage down to a somewhat more manageable level.

To rephrase this a bit more succinctly ;) there's a big difference 
between having no practical way to prevent something, and actually 
encouraging it.

Jeff Shannon
Technician/Programmer
Credit International