hash tables

[Jeff Dalton <jeff%aiai.edinburgh.ac.uk@NSS.Cs.Ucl.AC.UK>]

> Date: Tue, 19 Jul 88 00:05:31 PDT
> From: Jon L White <jonl%edsel@edu.stanford.labrea>

> In fact, I have heard some C programmers praise Common Lisp for it's inclusion
> of hash-tables.  They complain and complain about having to reinvent the
> wheel (hash-tables) over and over again.

Apropos of hash tables, one feature of Pop(Log) that I sometimes want
to have is "temporary properties".  They are essentially hash tables
such that being in them does not prevent being garbage collected.  An
object might have a property (in this table) and nonetheless be
collectable.  Is there some problem with such tables that makes them
not a good idea?  They certainly seem to be something users can't
write for themselves.

-- Jeff