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anaphora

Inspired by Paul Graham's classic "On Lisp" this module introduces anaphoric macros, which are unhygienic by design. Hence they can not be implemented with syntax-rules! In fact, they introduce new identifiers behind the scene, mostly named it, which can be referenced in the body without being declared. All macros in this module start with an a prefix to remind the user, that they pollute the namespace on purpose. Corresponding operators without this prefix are well known.

Remember, that in a natural language an anaphor is an expression, which refers back in the conversation: "Buy this book and read it."

Programming interface

anaphora

[syntax] (anaphora sym)

where sym is optional. Called without argument it returns the list of exported symbols, with one of those symbols as argument it returns its documentation.

aif

[syntax] (aif test? consequent [alternative])

Anaphoric version of if.

Binds the result of test? to the symbol it, which can than be used in the consequent or the mandatory anternative.

(aif (memv 3 '(1 2 3 4 5)) it #f)

awhen

[syntax] (awhen test? xpr . xprs)

Anaphoric version of when, i.e. the one-armed if, which allows multiple expressions to be evaluated, if test? succeeds. As with aif, the result of test? is stored in the variable it, which can be refered in xpr ...

(awhen (memv 3 '(1 2 3 4 5))
  (print it)
  (reverse it))

acond

[syntax] (acond ((test? xpr ...) ... [(else xpr1 ...)]))

Anaphoric version of cond.

The result of each test? is stored in the variable it, which can be used in the corresponding expressions xpr ...

(acond
	((memv 6 '(1 2 3 4 5)) it)
	((memv 3 '(1 2 3 4 5)) it)
	(else it))

Note, that the ordinary cond macro does something similar with the literal symbol =>.

awhile

[syntax] (awhile test? xpr . xprs)

Anaphoric version of while.

The body xpr . xprs is evaluated as often, as the test? is true. As usual, the result of this test?, which often is the result of a poll operation, is named it and can be referenced in the body.

(let ((lst '(1 2 3 4 5 #f)) (res '()))
	(awhile (car lst)
		(set! res (cons (car lst) res))
		(set! lst (cdr lst)))
	res)

Of course, this is not the preferred programming style in Scheme ...

aand

[syntax] (aand arg ...)

Anaphoric version of and.

When sequentially evaluating the arguments arg ..., the anaphor it will be bound to the value of the previous argument.

(let ((lst '(1 2 3)))
  (aand lst (cdr it) (cdr it)))

alambda

[syntax] (alambda args xpr . xprs)

Anaphoric version of lambda.

The resulting procedure is bound to the anaphor self. This way, anonymous functions can be recursive as well.

(map (alambda (n) (if (zero? n) 1 (* n (self (- n 1)))))
     '(1 2 3 4 5))

Usage

 
(use anaphora)

Last update

Sep 08, 2011

Author

Juergen Lorenz

License

 
Copyright (c) 2011, Juergen Lorenz
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modification, are permitted provided that the following conditions are
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Version History
0.3
helper-module anaphora-helper removed
0.2
documentation dispatcher added
0.1
initial import