[fpc-pascal] Feature proposal: function-based assignment operators

[Mark Morgan Lloyd]

Benito van der Zander wrote:
> Hi,
> quite often you need to change a value relatively to another value.
> For example:
> 
>   array1[array2[i]] := array1[array2[i]] + 42;
> 
> Luckily this can be written as
> 
>   array1[array2[i]] += 42;
> 
> Which is nice.
> 
> However, sometimes you do not need addition, but the minimum.
> For example:
> 
>    array1[array2[i]] := min(array1[array2[i]], 42);
> 
> Now, you need to repeat all the array indices.
> 
> Which is very ugly.
> 
> So there should be an alternative syntax, similar to += :
> I.e.:
> 
>    array1[array2[i]] min= 42;

Declare a custom function and mark it inline for efficiency. That also 
allows you to document it properly, have different implementations 
depending on the parameter types and so on.

There really are limits to the extent that the underlying Pascal should 
be mangled further. Your time would be better spent trying to persuade 
the core developers to tolerate extra operators like ⌊ for floor(), and 
then working out how to implement them >:-)

array1[array2[i]] := array1[array2[i]] ⌊ 42;
array1[array2[i]] ⌊= 42;

-- 
Mark Morgan Lloyd
markMLl .AT. telemetry.co .DOT. uk

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