; Checking of a LAND* special form ; ; LAND* is a generalized AND: it evaluates a sequence of forms one after another ; till the first one that yields #f; the non-#f result of a form can be bound ; to a fresh variable and used in the subsequent forms. ; ; When an ordinary AND is formed of _proper_ boolean expressions: ; (AND E1 E2 ...) ; expression E2, if it gets to be evaluated, knows that E1 has returned non-#f. ; Moreover, E2 knows exactly what the result of E1 was - #t - so E2 can use ; this knowledge to its advantage. If E1 however is an _extended_ ; boolean expression, E2 can no longer tell which particular non-#f ; value E1 has returned. Chances are it took a lot of work to evaluate E1, ; and the produced result (a number, a vector, a string, etc) may be of ; value to E2. Alas, the AND form merely checks that the result is not an #f, ; and throws it away. If E2 needs it, it has to recompute the value again. ; This proposed LAND* special form lets constituent expressions get ; hold of the results of already evaluated expressions, without re-doing ; their work. ; ; Syntax: ; LAND* (CLAWS) BODY ; ; where CLAWS is a list of expressions or bindings: ; CLAWS ::= '() | (cons CLAW CLAWS) ; Every element of the CLAWS list, a CLAW, must be one of the following: ; (VARIABLE EXPRESSION) ; or ; (EXPRESSION) ; or ; BOUND-VARIABLE ; These CLAWS are evaluated in the strict left-to-right order. For each ; CLAW, the EXPRESSION part is evaluated first (or BOUND-VARIABLE is looked up). ; If the result is #f, LAND* immediately returns #f, thus disregarding the rest ; of the CLAWS and the BODY. If the EXPRESSION evaluates to not-#f, and ; the CLAW is of the form ; (VARIABLE EXPRESSION) ; the EXPRESSION's value is bound to a freshly made VARIABLE. The VARIABLE is ; available for _the rest_ of the CLAWS, and the BODY. As usual, all ; VARIABLEs must be unique (like in let*). ; ; Thus LAND* is a sort of cross-breed between LET* and AND. ; ; Denotation semantics: ; ; Eval[ (LAND* (CLAW1 ...) BODY), Env] = ; EvalClaw[ CLAW1, Env ] andalso ; Eval[ (LAND* ( ...) BODY), ExtClawEnv[ CLAW1, Env]] ; ; Eval[ (LAND* (CLAW) ), Env] = EvalClaw[ CLAW, Env ] ; Eval[ (LAND* () FORM1 ...), Env] = Eval[ (BEGIN FORM1 ...), Env ] ; Eval[ (LAND* () ), Env] = #t ; ; EvalClaw[ BOUND-VARIABLE, Env ] = Eval[ BOUND-VARIABLE, Env ] ; EvalClaw[ (EXPRESSION), Env ] = Eval[ EXPRESSION, Env ] ; EvalClaw[ (VARIABLE EXPRESSION), Env ] = Eval[ EXPRESSION, Env ] ; ; ExtClawEnv[ BOUND-VARIABLE, Env ] = Env ; ExtClawEnv[ (EXPRESSION), Env ] = EnvAfterEval[ EXPRESSION, Env ] ; ExtClawEnv[ (VARIABLE EXPRESSION), Env ] = ; ExtendEnv[ EnvAfterEval[ EXPRESSION, Env ], ; VARIABLE boundto Eval[ EXPRESSION, Env ]] ; ; ; If one has a Scheme interpreter written in Prolog/ML/Haskell, he can ; implement the above semantics right away. Within Scheme, it is trivial to ; code LAND* with R4RS "define-syntax". Alas, Gambit does not have this ; facility. So this implementation uses macros instead. ; ; The following LAND* macro will convert a LAND* expression into a "tree" of ; AND and LET expressions. For example, ; (LAND* ((my-list (compute-list)) ((not (null? my-list)))) ; (do-something my-list)) ; is transformed into ; (and (let ((my-list (compute-list))) ; (and my-list (not (null? my-list)) (begin (do-something my-list))))) ; ; I must admit the LAND* macro is written in a pathetic anti-functional style. ; To my excuse, the macro's goal is a syntactic transformation of source ; code, that is, performing a re-writing. IMHO, rewriting kind of suggests ; mutating. ; ; Sample applications: ; ; The following piece of code (from my treap package) ; (let ((new-root (node:dispatch-on-key root key ...))) ; (if new-root (set! root new-root))) ; could be elegantly re-written as ; (land* ((new-root (node:dispatch-on-key root key ...))) ; (set! root new-root)) ; ; A very common application of land* is looking up a value ; associated with a given key in an assoc list, returning #f in case of a ; look-up failure: ; ; ; Standard implementation ; (define (look-up key alist) ; (let ((found-assoc (assq key alist))) ; (and found-assoc (cdr found-assoc)))) ; ; ; A more elegant solution ; (define (look-up key alist) ; (cdr (or (assq key alist) '(#f . #f)))) ; ; ; An implementation which is just as graceful as the latter ; ; and just as efficient as the former: ; (define (look-up key alist) ; (land* ((x (assq key alist))) (cdr x))) ; ; Generalized cond: ; ; (or ; (land* (bindings-cond1) body1) ; (land* (bindings-cond2) body2) ; (begin else-clause)) ; ; Unlike => (cond's send), LAND* applies beyond cond. LAND* can also be used ; to generalize cond, as => is limited to sending of only a single value; ; LAND* allows as many bindings as necessary (which are performed in sequence) ; ; (or ; (land* ((c (read-char)) ((not (eof-object? c)))) ; (string-set! some-str i c) (++! i)) ; (begin (do-process-eof))) ; ; Another concept LAND* is reminiscent of is programming with guards: ; a LAND* form can be considered a sequence of _guarded_ expressions. ; In a regular program, forms may produce results, bind them to variables ; and let other forms use these results. LAND* differs in that it checks ; to make sure that every produced result "makes sense" (that is, not an #f). ; The first "failure" triggers the guard and aborts the rest of the ; sequence (which presumably would not make any sense to execute anyway). ; ; $Id: vland-gambit.scm,v 1.1 1998/12/28 23:54:29 srfimgr Exp $ (library (SRFI-2) (export land*) (import (ikarus)) (define-syntax land* (lambda (x) (define free-id (car (generate-temporaries '(_)))) (define (bound-identifier? x) (and (identifier? x) (not (free-identifier=? x (datum->syntax free-id (syntax->datum x)))))) (syntax-case x () [(_ ()) #t] [(_ (claws ...) b b* ...) #'(land* (claws ... (tmp (begin b b* ...))))] [(_ ([var expr])) #'expr] [(_ ([expr])) #'expr] [(_ (var)) (if (bound-identifier? #'var) #'var (syntax-error #'var "var is unbound in land* clause"))] [(_ ([var expr] claws ...)) (identifier? #'var) #'(cond [expr => (lambda (var) (land* (claws ...)))] [else #f])] [(_ ([expr] claws ...)) #'(and expr (land* (claws ...)))] [(_ (var claws ...)) (if (bound-identifier? #'var) #'(and var (land* (claws ...))) (syntax-error #'var "var is unbound in land* clause"))])))) #!eof #| (define-macro (LAND* claws . body) (let* ((new-vars '()) (result (cons 'and '())) (growth-point result)) ; We need a way to report a syntax error ; the following is how Gambit compiler does it... (##define-macro (ct-error-syntax msg . args) `(##signal '##signal.syntax-error #t ,msg ,@args)) (define (andjoin! clause) (let ((prev-point growth-point) (clause-cell (cons clause '()))) (set-cdr! growth-point clause-cell) (set! growth-point clause-cell))) (if (not (list? claws)) (ct-error-syntax "bindings must be a list " bindings)) (for-each (lambda (claw) (cond ((symbol? claw) ; BOUND-VARIABLE form (andjoin! claw)) ((and (pair? claw) (null? (cdr claw))) ; (EXPRESSION) form (andjoin! (car claw))) ; (VARIABLE EXPRESSION) form ((and (pair? claw) (symbol? (car claw)) (pair? (cdr claw)) (null? (cddr claw))) (let* ((var (car claw)) (var-cell (cons var '()))) (if (memq var new-vars) (ct-error-syntax "duplicate variable " var " in the bindings")) (set! new-vars (cons var new-vars)) (set-cdr! growth-point `((LET (,claw) (AND . ,var-cell)))) (set! growth-point var-cell))) (else (ct-error-syntax "An ill-formed binding in a syntactic form land* " claw)) )) claws) (if (not (null? body)) (andjoin! `(begin ,@body))) result)) |# ; Validation tests (##include "myenv.scm") (##include "catch-error.scm") (display "\nValidating LAND*...\n\n") ; make sure that the 'FORM' gave upon evaluation the ; EXPECTED-RESULT (define-macro (expect form expected-result) `(begin (display "evaluating ") (write ',form) (let ((real-result (eval ',form))) (if (equal? real-result ,expected-result) (cout "... gave the expected result: " real-result nl) (error "... yielded: " real-result " which differs from the expected result: " ,expected-result) )))) ; Check to see that 'form' has indeed a wrong syntax (define-macro (must-be-a-syntax-error form) `(call-with-current-continuation (lambda (k) (##catch-signal '##signal.syntax-error (lambda x (display "catching a syntax error: ") (display x) (newline) (k #f)) (lambda () (eval ',form) (error "No syntax error detected, unexpectedly")))))) (expect (land* () 1) 1) (expect (land* () 1 2) 2) (expect (land* () ) #t) (expect (let ((x #f)) (land* (x))) #f) (expect (let ((x 1)) (land* (x))) 1) (expect (land* ((x #f)) ) #f) (expect (land* ((x 1)) ) 1) (must-be-a-syntax-error (land* ( #f (x 1))) ) (expect (land* ( (#f) (x 1)) ) #f) (must-be-a-syntax-error (land* (2 (x 1))) ) (expect (land* ( (2) (x 1)) ) 1) (expect (land* ( (x 1) (2)) ) 2) (expect (let ((x #f)) (land* (x) x)) #f) (expect (let ((x "")) (land* (x) x)) "") (expect (let ((x "")) (land* (x) )) "") (expect (let ((x 1)) (land* (x) (+ x 1))) 2) (expect (let ((x #f)) (land* (x) (+ x 1))) #f) (expect (let ((x 1)) (land* (((positive? x))) (+ x 1))) 2) (expect (let ((x 1)) (land* (((positive? x))) )) #t) (expect (let ((x 0)) (land* (((positive? x))) (+ x 1))) #f) (expect (let ((x 1)) (land* (((positive? x)) (x (+ x 1))) (+ x 1))) 3) (must-be-a-syntax-error (let ((x 1)) (land* (((positive? x)) (x (+ x 1)) (x (+ x 1))) (+ x 1))) ) (expect (let ((x 1)) (land* (x ((positive? x))) (+ x 1))) 2) (expect (let ((x 1)) (land* ( ((begin x)) ((positive? x))) (+ x 1))) 2) (expect (let ((x 0)) (land* (x ((positive? x))) (+ x 1))) #f) (expect (let ((x #f)) (land* (x ((positive? x))) (+ x 1))) #f) (expect (let ((x #f)) (land* ( ((begin x)) ((positive? x))) (+ x 1))) #f) (expect (let ((x 1)) (land* (x (y (- x 1)) ((positive? y))) (/ x y))) #f) (expect (let ((x 0)) (land* (x (y (- x 1)) ((positive? y))) (/ x y))) #f) (expect (let ((x #f)) (land* (x (y (- x 1)) ((positive? y))) (/ x y))) #f) (expect (let ((x 3)) (land* (x (y (- x 1)) ((positive? y))) (/ x y))) 3/2) (display "\nAll tests passed\n") (let ((a-definition '(define (bbb) (LAND* ((my-list (compute-list)) a-condition ((not (null? my-list))) (my-list-tail (cdr my-list))) (do-something my-list-tail))))) (cout "The result of compiling of\n" (lambda () (pp a-definition)) "\nis the following\n") (eval a-definition) (pp bbb) )