[swift-evolution] [Review] SE-0023 API Design Guidelines

[Adriano Ferreira]

Indeed, Ruby has an interesting convention where a question mark (?) is used for boolean functions/methods:

In Swift: foo.contains(...)
In Ruby: foo.include?(...)

In Swift: foo.isEmpty
In Ruby: foo.empty?

Well, in the last case `isEmpty` is a property whereas `empty?` is a method, but the idea is similar.


Also, an exclamation mark (!) is generally used to indicate that a function/method mutates `self`:

Non-mutating:

Swift — foo.reverse()
Ruby — foo.reverse

Mutating:

Swift — foo.reverseInPlace()
Ruby — foo.reverse!


Non-mutating:

Swift — foo.sort()  or  foo.sort({…})
Ruby — foo.sort  or  foo.sort {…}

Mutating:

Swift — foo.sortInPlace()  or  foo.sortInPlace({…})
Ruby — foo.sort!  or  foo.sort! {…} 


I think it’s a simple and nice way of addressing the naming issue of mutating vs. non-mutating or pure vs. impure functions/methods. However, this conflicts with the syntax sugar of Optionals and, therefore, following this path would have a clear impact in the language.

Best,

— A

> On Jan 23, 2016, at 3:46 PM, Jacob Bandes-Storch via swift-evolution <swift-evolution at swift.org> wrote:
> 
> On Sat, Jan 23, 2016 at 12:44 PM, J. Cheyo Jimenez via swift-evolution <swift-evolution at swift.org <mailto:swift-evolution at swift.org>> wrote:
> The inPlace proposal is excellent. As suggested something like x.=f() would be perfect to distinguish mutating methods .Something I don't like from the API design guidelines is that non mutating methods like enumerate would be become enumerated. In my mind enumerate is a word of art and I don't ever think of it as muting so having to always use enumerated in the future seems weird. Also having to ed/ing non mutating methods seems to make mutating methods more important. 
> 
> //non mutating suggestion
> x.sort()
> x.split()
> 
> //other ideas for mutating methods names
> x.sort*()
> x.sort&() // I like & the most
> x.split&()
> x.sort@()
> 
> By marking a method with a special character at the end, the reader would know that the method mutates. 
> 
> Ruby uses ! for this, by convention: http://stackoverflow.com/questions/612189/why-are-exclamation-marks-used-in-ruby-methods <http://stackoverflow.com/questions/612189/why-are-exclamation-marks-used-in-ruby-methods>
> 
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