[Haskell-cafe] an idea for modifiyng data/newtype syntax: use `::=` instead of `=`

[Brandon Allbery]

On Sat, Aug 8, 2015 at 5:33 PM, Kosyrev Serge <_deepfire at feelingofgreen.ru>
wrote:

>
> What about the precedents?
>
>  - TransformListComp: group, by, using
>  - RecursiveDo: mdo, rec
>

If I see those then I know that something is going on.
If I don't see `data` and do see some new keyword in its place then I am
not reading Haskell code; I know this because I have Haskell code and it
uses `data`.
If I see `data` and it means something different than what Haskell means by
`data`? Oh right, you have decided your incompatible language is still
"Haskell", I just have to deal with the fact that it means something
completely different now.

Have you ever come back to a project 6 months after you last worked on it,
or a year after, and had to figure it out again?
Consider how well that works when you've decided to mutate the language in
the meantime, and your mission critical code was not permitted to be
rewritten in the new language because it is mission critical and "oh just
run this automated script to fix it" is not a plan that passes business
review processes.

-- 
brandon s allbery kf8nh                               sine nomine associates
allbery.b at gmail.com                                  ballbery at sinenomine.net
unix, openafs, kerberos, infrastructure, xmonad        http://sinenomine.net
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