[m-dev.] shims

[Mark Brown]

On Mon, Sep 15, 2014 at 3:46 PM, Peter Wang <novalazy at gmail.com> wrote:
> Hi Mark,
>
> On Sun, 14 Sep 2014 12:51:44 +1000, Mark Brown <mark at mercurylang.org> wrote:
>> This is much more verbose than Peter's suggestion, but aside from the
>> better checking it's also much more flexible because you can target
>> different libraries, not just different versions of the same library.
>> For example, if there is a module called fastlib that only some
>> developers have in their path, you might write:
>>
>>     :- pred algorithm(int::in, int::out) is det,
>>     :- if.
>>         :- import_module fastlib.           % This can fail.
>>         :- pred fastlib.algorithm(int::in, int::out) is det.
>>     :- then.
>>         algorithm(X, Y) :- fastlib.algorithm(X, Y).
>>     :- else.
>>         algorithm(X, Y) :- slow_algorithm(X, Y).
>>     :- end_if.
>>
>> Note that, even though fastlib is imported, we still have to declare
>> the predicates from it that are used. This enables the then branch to
>> be checked even if the import fails, and also allows a check that
>> fastlib itself is the right version.
>
> I like it.
>
> Is it fair to think of each if-then branch declaring something like an
> anonymous nested sub-module, with forwarding of predicates and types
> from the parent module to the sub-module?

Exactly. That was the motivation for the syntax, too.

Cheers,
Mark.