FPtr

[Manuel M. T. Chakravarty]

malcolm-ffi at cs.york.ac.uk wrote,

> > Simon and I noticed this morning that ForeignObj should
> > really be parameterised.  The current type of newForeignObj is
> >   newForeignObj :: Ptr a -> IO () -> IO ForeignObj
> > This immediately loses the type information on the Ptr!
> > Shouldn't it be
> >   newForeignObj :: Ptr a -> IO () -> IO (ForeignObj a)
> 
> I agree that once we adopt (Ptr a) in preference to Addr, ForeignObj
> may in some cases probably also be better parameterised as well.
> But *please* choose a different name (like we did with Ptr/Addr)
> for backward compatibility.
> 
> > Or maybe we should shorten it to (FPtr a)?  ("F" for "finalised".)
> 
> I dislike cryptic abbreviations on principle.  "Ptr" is clear,
> "FPtr" is not.  How about "FinalisedPtr" (only 2 chars longer than
> "ForeignObj")?  Or indeed, "ForeignPtr", which is the same length?

I think, I like `ForeignPtr'.  Semantically, it makes sense
given that these pointers are usually used for foreign ADTs.

Manuel