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Re: [Help-smalltalk] asString for Floats?
From: |
Stephen Compall |
Subject: |
Re: [Help-smalltalk] asString for Floats? |
Date: |
Sun, 05 Nov 2006 22:21:19 -0600 |
User-agent: |
Thunderbird 1.5.0.7 (Macintosh/20060909) |
Michael Fellinger wrote:
>> st> #($p $o $n $g) asString printNl!
>> 'pong'
>> st> #($p $o $n $g) printNl!
>> ($p $o $n $g )
>>
>> Languages that rely on a single method convert-to-string protocol blur
>> this important distinction.
>
> My brain very much appreciates blurring such things, as it helps
> concentrating
> on the problem, not the implementation ;)
If it helps, #printString is the universal protocol (applicable to all
objects), whereas #asString is specific to a few objects that have
equivalent representations as strings.
I think Java's toString() was supposed to offer similar functionality
as the #printOn: protocol; they just forgot that when writing some of
the methods. This is too bad.
--
Stephen Compall
http://scompall.nocandysw.com/blog
##smalltalk,#gnu-smalltalk on Freenode IRC