Date: Sat, 28 Dec 85 18:02 EST
From: David A. Moon <Moon@SCRC-STONY-BROOK.ARPA>
Date: Thu, 26 Dec 85 16:09 EST
From: Guy Steele <gls@THINK-AQUINAS.ARPA>
...
But this prompts in me another question: does
(defstruct (foo (:constructor build-foo (&optional baz &aux baz)))
(baz 5))
mean that
(make-foo) initializes BAZ to 5
(make-foo :baz 43) initializes BAZ to 43
(build-foo 91) initializes BAZ to 91
(build-foo) *does not initialize* BAZ ?
If not, how else can I say it? (Never mind why I would want to.)
Isn't this in conflict with your (Guy's) suggested clarification to page 60,
that a function may not have two parameters with the same name? If that clarification
was not intended to apply to &AUX variables, you didn't say so.
Yes, I suppose it is; but then the interpretation of &AUX variables in
this context is completely crocky anyway. I think I prefer to have the
very simple rule that no duplicate names are permitted within a single
parameter list, period. One can come up with reasonable interpretations
in many special cases, but such cases are probably all very poor
examples of style.
The way I read the Common Lisp manual, your example defstruct above does not
define any function named make-foo. You'd have to say
(defstruct (foo (:constructor build-foo (&optional baz &aux baz))
(:constructor make-foo))
(baz 5))
if you wanted that.
Funny. I always thought that the normal constructor always gets created
unless explicitly suppressed with (:constructor nil), BOA constructors
being irrelevant to the question. However, I now find that the prose at
the bottom of page 315 is horribly ambiguous.
I think the answer to "how else can I say it?" is that you can't say
it except by being more explicit and verbose, e.g.
(defstruct (foo (:constructor build-foo (&optional baz))
(:constructor make-foo (&key (baz 5))))
baz)
This sounds fine to me. This might be awkward if "5" were a very large
expression and I wanted three constructors, two of which initialize slot
BAZ, but I am not going to lose sleep over it.
--Guy