🚀 go-pugleaf

In article <1992Sep6.155059.13349@afs.com> greg@afs.com writes:> In artic
> A selector name, like a C function, should only have one set of  
> argument types. [Think about it: you wouldn't write two C functions with  
> the same name, but different arguments, even if they were static to the  
> module in which they appeared. Well, you might, but you couldn't get a job  
> with my firm. 8^)]

actually having several functions share a single name can be very useful.
Its called overloading of course and exists in languages like Ada and C++.

As long as the compiler can resolve the reference to the correct call,
and you only overload semantically similar operations, it can be a great convenience.

There's no need to remember half a dozen names for the same conceptual operation.
you could then use just setValue: instead of setStringValue:, setIntValue:,
setFloatValue: etc - the compiler can figure out which one you meant from the
argument type and you can worry about other things.  Its convenient for some
of the same reasons that polymorphism is.

The AppKit would be a lot simpler to learn if Obj C allowed overloading IMHO.

of course it can be abused and lead to confusion - like most powerful features.

I once saw someone spend hours trying to figure out why he got a division by zero
error on a line that did not contain any division operators.  It turned out he
had redefined the operators to get a particular form of unit conversion (fine)
and had cut and pasted the division routine into the multiplication routine.



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Alex Blakemore alex@cs.umd.edu   NeXT mail accepted