[swift-evolution] SetAlgebra naming update

[Dave Abrahams]

on Thu Mar 24 2016, Erica Sadun <erica-AT-ericasadun.com> wrote:

>> On Mar 24, 2016, at 6:19 PM, Dave Abrahams via swift-evolution <swift-evolution at swift.org> wrote:
>> 
>> 
>> on Thu Mar 24 2016, Erica Sadun <swift-evolution at swift.org> wrote:
>> 
>
>>>> 
>>>> On Mar 24, 2016, at 2:39 PM, Dave Abrahams via swift-evolution <swift-evolution at swift.org> wrote:
>>>> 
>>>> 
>>>> Just an update:
>>> 
>>>> 
>>>> The naming guidelines working group went back into negotiation over
>>>> the shape of SetAlgebra (and thus, Set and OptionSet) for
>>>> Swift 3, and reached a new consensus.  We intend to bring forward a
>>>> proposal for the API shown here:
>>>> 
>>>> http://dabrahams.github.io/swift-naming/SetAlgebra-Math.html
>>>> 
>>>> and to update the guidelines to suggest using the "form" prefix to
>>>> create a verb phrase for a mutating method when the operation is
>>>> fundamentally non-mutating and described by a noun.
>>> 
>>> I've got to say, I expected to hate this until I clicked the link and saw the actual 
>>> proposed syntax. For the most part, it's good: clear and readable.
>>> 
>>> Not a fan of "subtracting" (would prefer "bySubtracting"). Other than that
>>> really impressed by how this evolved.
>> 
>>      x by subtracting y
>> 
>> means, “give me x, and get it by subtracting y.”  The use of “byXXXing”
>> in existing Cocoa APIs doesn't really set a precedent because it was
>> always preceded by a noun that described the result being returned,
>> e.g. “x.stringByAppending(y),” which is a completely different thing.
>> 
>
> So far in each of the naming situations where I have disliked a particular form
> ("subtracting" here), the final results have been good.  Apparently
> the strategy of pointing out the bad points and letting magic happen behind
> the scenes is a successful one.
>
> Because that's not very helpful: 
>
> * excluding
> * differenceFrom
> * minus
> * excepting
> * subtractingElementsFrom / subtractingElements(from: or of:

Don't forget, you need to come up with a pair of mutating/nonmutating
names.

-- 
Dave