Symbols as parameters?

[Alf P. Steinbach]

* Carl Banks:
> On Jan 21, 2:38 am, "Alf P. Steinbach" <al... at start.no> wrote:
>> * Carl Banks:
>>
>>> On Jan 20, 11:43 pm, Martin Drautzburg <Martin.Drautzb... at web.de>
>> [snip]
>>
>>>> What I am really looking for is a way
>>>>         - to be able to call move(up)
>>>>         - having the "up" symbol only in the context of the function call
>>> Short answer is, you can't do it.
>> On the contrary, it's not difficult to do.
>>
>> I provided an example in my answer to the OP (first reply in the thread).
> 
> Your example doesn't remotely do what the OP was asking for.  In fact
> your example is so preposterous I question your sanity.

Your first sentence is incorrect, your second sentence is a silly attempt at 
getting personal.


>> However, it's IMHO an abuse of the language, not something that one should do.
> 
> Usually people abuse the language to achieve something (ostensibly)
> useful.  Your example is so useless I don't think I would even call it
> abuse.

You are correct that it's useless. The OP asked for a construct to do a useless 
thing. The presented construct does exactly what the OP asked for: useless.


> As best as I can tell, what it is is you attempting to make yourself
> look like some kind of badass by answering some absurdly literal
> interpretation of the OP's question.

Hm, there are ways to do things, even the ad hominem thing. You just present 
yourself as one using strong words when you're proven wrong. Myself I'm not 
foreign to strong words :-), but I wouldn't dream of applying them to a person.

The above is very, uh, primitive.

Besides, it's quite silly to get angry when you're proved to be wrong. :-)


> Except you haven't even done that:
> 
> class using_directions:
>     up = 42
>     move( up )
>     print up # <- clearly not confined to context of function call

You know, I didn't think of that ingenious thing, that it would be possible to 
*modify* the example so that it no longer fit the OP's literal description. Thx!


Cheers & hth.,

- Alf