layout rule infelicity

[Lennart Augustsson]

Jon Fairbairn wrote:

>
> I wasn't fit enough to follow the earlier discussions of the
> layout rule, so I'm not sure how this interacts with
> previous awkward cases.  I'd be happiest if we could come up
> with a rule that didn't involve sticking in braces and
> semicolons because it won't parse otherwise. Can someone
> remind me why the "A close brace is also inserted whenever
> the syntactic category containing the layout list ends" part
> of the rule is there?

It's so you can write
    let x = 2+2 in x*x
(and similar things)

I think this inserting a '}' when there would otherwise have been
a syntax error is a terrible mistake.  It makes it almost impossible
to implement correctly, and to understand.  But it's with us now in H98.

    -- Lennart