Re: LOGO-L>Please try beta-test "punctuationless variable"

[John Wolff <J.Wolff@ffp.csiro.au>]

On Mon,  6 Apr 98 06:01 pdt jstclair@omsd.cerf.fred.org wrote:

> >From - bh@anarres.CS.Berkeley.EDU (Brian Harvey)
> 
> A beta-test version of Berkeley Logo, version 5.0, is available
> for downloading.  This version implements the "punctuationless variable"
> feature we've been discussing.  I'd like comp.lang.logo / LOGO-L
> Logo programmers and teachers to try this out before announcing it
> to the world.

Brian,

I tried this out on my chief Logo tester, aged 11, previously exposed to UCB 
Logo, MSW Logo, Microworlds/DOS, and most recently (and enthusiastically) 
Comenius/Superlogo. His initial impressions were good, until he made a 
procedure and a variable with the same name. Something like this:

to square size      
repeat 4 [ fd size rt 90 ]
end                 ; neat, no dots

setsize 100         
show size
square size         ; OK, these all work fine

to size             ; now let's make some other sizes
op random 100
end

show size
37
show :size
100                 ; OK, that makes sense

square size         ; which size, and why isn't it square?

Debugging this was far more confusing than ever before, because: "With the 
dots and quotes you _know_ which are variables and which are procedures; 
this way when you see the name you can't be sure". After a few more 
explorations, he went back to doing it the old way, having apparently 
decided that the certainty was worth more than the convenience. 

I would like to see some other experiences posted to logo-l, especially from 
folk starting from scratch with the dotless style.

Regards,

John Wolff
Melbourne, Australia.




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