[swift-evolution] Strings in Swift 4

[Dave Abrahams]

on Tue Jan 24 2017, Matt Whiteside <swift-evolution at swift.org> wrote:

>> On Jan 22, 2017, at 15:40, Chris Lattner via swift-evolution
> <swift-evolution at swift.org> wrote:
>> Right, the only sensible semantics for a one sided range with an
>> open end point is that it goes to the end of the collection.  I see
>> a few different potential colors to paint this bikeshed with, all of
>> which would have the semantics “c[i..<c.endIndex]”:
>
>> 
>> 1) Provide "c[i...]":
>> 2) Provide "c[i..<]":
>> 3) Provide both "c[i..<]” and "c[i…]":
>> 
>> Since all of these operations would have the same behavior, it comes down to subjective questions:
>> 
>> a) Do we want redundancy?  IMO, no, which is why #3 is not very desirable.
>> b) Which is easier to explain to people?  As you say, "i..< is shorthand for i..<endindex” is nice
> and simple, which leans towards #2.
>> c) Which is subjectively nicer looking?  IMO, #1 is much nicer
>> typographically.  The ..< formulation looks like symbol soup,
>> particularly because most folks would not put a space before ].
>> 
>> There is no obvious winner, but to me, I tend to prefer #1.  What do other folks think?
>
> I also prefer #1.  It’s a shame that this conflicts with the potential
> syntax for variadic generics.  Is there really no way around this?
> I’m showing my ignorance on compilers here, but couldn’t the fact that
> variadic generics will be inside angle brackets be used to
> distinguish?

The variadic use cases don't always have ... appearing inside angle
brackets.  See “pack expansion” at
http://en.cppreference.com/w/cpp/language/parameter_pack
for example.

-- 
-Dave