[swift-evolution] [DRAFT] Regularizing Where Grammar (was Re: Add a while clause to for loops)

[Brandon Knope]

Your patience in the face of my hysterics is truly inspirational (no sarcasm!). 

I just want to say up front that I hope none of my emails come across as an attack. They are just coming from a place of passion. Based on your rational responses to me, I think you do understand that :)

I am not concerned about Swift not letting me do something. I am concerned about the fun and beauty of the resulting code.

For example, I got into Objective-C because it was fun. It can read like poetry with its verbose methods and was so much simpler to me than other languages like C/C++/Java.

My fear is that this fun will be removed from Swift after I have invested so much time into it. 

I can still be productive because Swift still allows me to build things.

But will it be as fun in the future? Will it just feel like C++…all sterile and very bleep bloop bloopy (my description of what people PICTURE in their heads when they think of people programming…you know their impression that we are just typing 0s and 1s).

I had the luxury of coming into Objective-C near the end, so I didn’t have to go through all the syntax changes (well some of them). Maybe if I had joined ObjC from the beginning I would have either hated or loved the direction it was going. It’s hard to say.

Coming into a brand new language is much different to say the least. Swift 1 and 2 introduced a very beautiful and expressive language in my opinion. Swift 3 is still expressive, but with some of these proposals, it feels like some of that is being stripped away little by little and it is a very uncomfortable feeling

My concerns may be unfounded. I just fear that the simplicity that brought me to Objective-C and then Swift will be lost over time if it starts turning into something as complex as C++ (which I do not enjoy writing in).

I hope this makes some sense about my perspective
Brandon


> On Jun 10, 2016, at 3:52 PM, Xiaodi Wu <xiaodi.wu at gmail.com> wrote:
> 
> On Fri, Jun 10, 2016 at 2:38 PM, Brandon Knope via swift-evolution <swift-evolution at swift.org <mailto:swift-evolution at swift.org>> wrote:
> Thanks for the laugh!
> 
> The last week or so is actually stressing me out about the direction where swift is going…
> 
> I hope it is just a fleeting feeling but that remains to be seen. I am beginning to think my interests and taste are no longer aligning with the communities or core teams.
> 
> Brandon
> 
> I think, given the usage statistics, we'll find that these amount to small nips and tucks. I can't speak to whether things will be to your taste, but please rest assured that these proposals do not arise out of anyone's taste or distaste (outside that of the core team). If taste were the basis for proposals, I'd be proposing rather larger changes to the syntax, but I appreciate that my personal taste is of no import.
> 
> But as to interests, please do speak loudly and without reserve if any proposed changes are putting a stop to real-world (or even anticipated) uses you have. That's precisely what this process is about.
>  
> 
> > On Jun 10, 2016, at 3:25 PM, L. Mihalkovic via swift-evolution <swift-evolution at swift.org <mailto:swift-evolution at swift.org>> wrote:
> >
> > Goodness... where is this language going.....
> >
> >> On Jun 10, 2016, at 9:08 PM, Erica Sadun via swift-evolution <swift-evolution at swift.org <mailto:swift-evolution at swift.org>> wrote:
> >>
> >>
> >>> On Jun 10, 2016, at 1:06 PM, Rob Norback via swift-evolution <swift-evolution at swift.org <mailto:swift-evolution at swift.org>> wrote:
> >>>
> >>> Following Brent's logic that the for-in where should mimic the switch statement functionality, then this example:
> >>>
> >>> for (eachKey, eachValue)
> >>> where eachValue > 5
> >>> in theKeyValuePairs {... }
> >>
> >> <squish>
> >>
> >> I finally convinced myself of which direction I wanted to go: https://github.com/apple/swift-evolution/pull/362/files <https://github.com/apple/swift-evolution/pull/362/files>
> >>
> >> Related blog post here: http://ericasadun.com/2016/06/10/swift-where-oh-where-can-my-where-clause-be/ <http://ericasadun.com/2016/06/10/swift-where-oh-where-can-my-where-clause-be/>
> >>
> >> Big thanks to Brent and Wux.
> >>
> >> -- E
> >>
> >>
> >>
> >>
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