merge (Re: zip or marry etc)

[Peter Schneider-Kamp]

Aahz Maruch wrote:
> 
> In article <39763FF4.2CA5BF75 at schneider-kamp.de>,
> Peter Schneider-Kamp  <peter at schneider-kamp.de> wrote:
> >Aahz Maruch wrote:
> >>
> >> Precisely.  "Zip" has come to mean compression, and I think *that's* a
> >
> >I hate to warm up the whole thread from python-dev, but I'll post
> >a quote from /F:
> 
> Some of these make sense, others are absurd.  And while I'm sure /F
> meant this as a joke, I feel a need to respond seriously:
> 
> >/F:
> >> is this the end of Python development?
> >>
> >> just imagine what this crowd would have done if guido had asked
> >> you *before* he added things like:
> >>
> >>     dir ("hey, dir should give you a list of filenames")
> 
> Directories existed before DOS.  Not relevant.
> 
> >>     del ("removes files, right?")
> 
> Ditto.
> 
> >>     compile ("but people will think that it generates
> >>     machine code")
> 
> A point, but mostly <shrug>
> 
> >>     global ("but it's not truly global. how about regional
> >>     or domestic?")
> 
> <snort>  Amusing.
> 
> >>     hash ("that's a data type, right?") ("or perhaps something
> >>     from the The Amsterdam Aloha Seed Bank?")
> 
> Again, "hash" has long since had a relevant meaning for computers.
> 
> >>     hex ("now wait.  it's not clear from the name if it con-
> >>     verts a hex string to an integer, or the other way around.
> >>     oh, it's the latter.  sorry, but that will confuse perl pro-
> >>     grammers")
> 
> IIRC, at that point in time, Perl was not a standard other languages
> were being judged against.
> 
> >Come on, other languages can live with zip(), too.
> 
> I think I was insufficiently clear: in addition to "zip" having a known
> meaning, it does not have any connotation in computer terms of combining
> data that I've ever seen.  Yeah, if you want to call it "zipper", I
> might almost see your point.

Yes, it does have a connotation in computer terms. At least for people
with a functional programming background.

But which word did we yet discover, which connotation in computer term
really matches the intended meaning?

If there wasn't this cross product connotation problem I'd really
prefer the syntactic sugar:

for x,y; y in [(1,2), (3,4)]; [5, 6]

That's (for me) as clear as it can get.

Peter
--
Peter Schneider-Kamp          ++47-7388-7331
Herman Krags veg 51-11        mailto:peter at schneider-kamp.de
N-7050 Trondheim              http://schneider-kamp.de