Re: Repetition syntax

On Mon, 1 Dec 2025 23:53:40 +0000
Bethan Tovey-Walsh <bytheway@linguacelta.com> wrote:

> but that would
> > depend on (say)
> >  -letter x (3, 5)
> > not being ambiguous.
> > 
> As I mentioned, anything that requires whitespace around an operator
> would mean a new, more complicated, approach to whitespace.

would
-letter x(3, 5)
work?

 It would
> also make the repetition operator's syntax different from that of "*"
> and "+", which I think is not a good thing.

fair.

i'd thought of @ by analogy with e.g. invoices and quantities.

What about (* 3, 5) ? (with spaces optional of course)

> 
> As for interleaving, don't we already have that with separators?

don't think so. In RNG, interleave says its children can appear in any
order, so shoe & sock matches shoe sock as well as sock shoe. It comes
from the SGML & operator in DTDs, but without the incredible
difficulties that operator caused there.

liam




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Received on Tuesday, 2 December 2025 00:06:48 UTC