introspection (and Perl 6)

[Jonathan Stowe]

On Mon, 2008-01-21 at 21:04 +0000, Aaron Trevena wrote:
> On 21/01/2008, Ovid <publiustemp-londonpm at yahoo.com> wrote:
> > --- Aaron Trevena <aaron.trevena at gmail.com> wrote:
> >
> > > On 21/01/2008, Jeff Anderson <captvanhalen at gmail.com> wrote:
> > > > $class.^can('foo')
> > > >
> > > > That syntax is nearly as elegant as mud is not. :P
> > >
> > > Yes - what's wrong with just having a can method, it's say not ^say,
> > > so why the silly hat?
> >
> > I think the problem here is that when you universally shove things into
> > all objects, you force your changes on everyone.
> >
> >   $class.^can('foo');
> >
> > That's actually shorthand for:
> >
> >   $class.HOW.can('foo');
> 
> Kinda neat. :)
> 
> I don't mind the hat as long as it's shorthand for golfers that I'll
> never need to use or read in production code.
> 

But why have it in the first place, appeasing "golfers" is surely not
one of the design goals of the language.

And you know that you *will* see it in production code. That is assuming
you ever see any Perl 6 production code.

/J\