Re: Reader option to permit brackets as parentheses

[Greg Badros <gjb@cs.washington.edu>]

Christian Lynbech <chl@tbit.dk> writes:

> IMHO, the guile reader is far too stupid as it is, so how about the
> following compromise: we extend the system with reader macros instead. 
> 
> For instance, we could have a reader option 'reader-dispatch-character-alist'
> (matching characters with functions) that would enable the reader to
> call out to a user defined function when encountering such a
> character.
> 
> This way Greg could have his fancy parentheses, plus we could get all
> sorts of additional bonuses such as CL's #+.
> 
> This would not conflict with future standards as such, because if
> someone wants to enable [ and ] to work as ( and ), it would be his
> own personal decision.

Seems reasonable to me;  I'm of course a bit concerned about a
performance hit, but I trust that the dispatch can be implemented
efficiently enough.

Greg