Re: Writing a HoldAll function that evaluates its arguments
- To: mathgroup at smc.vnet.net
- Subject: [mg86250] Re: Writing a HoldAll function that evaluates its arguments
- From: Jens-Peer Kuska <kuska at informatik.uni-leipzig.de>
- Date: Fri, 7 Mar 2008 02:25:18 -0500 (EST)
- References: <fqo8h1$sq9$1@smc.vnet.net>
Hi,
you should think over your question.
The And[] function is a Kernel function
written in C++.
In C++ this behaviour is needed to prevent
the access of a pointer that is not allocated
because
if(true==a->flag) { ... }
will crash your C++ code if a is NULL and so one writes
if(a && true==a->flag) { ... }
and is save. In Mathematica are no pointers and
so one needs this not realy.
You can mimic
The behaviour of And[] with
Clear[myAndLike]
SetAttributes[myAndLike, HoldAll]
myAndLike[seq__] := Block[{tmp},
Catch[
If[(tmp = ReleaseHold[#]) === False, Throw[False], tmp] & /@
Map[Hold , Unevaluated[{seq}], {1}]
]
]
and
myAndLike[1 == 1, 3 == 2, Print["Hi!"]; a + a + a]
will return False and Print[] nothing
while
myAndLike[1 == 1, 1 + 2 == 3, Print["Hi!"]; a + a + a]
Print "Hi!" and return
{True, True, 3 a}
Regards
Jens
PS: Once you enter the evaluation, it is always done
until the result change no more and so it is not possible
to make a "evaluates each of its arguments exactly once"
like LIPS does.
Szabolcs Horv=E1t wrote:
> What is the simplest and most elegant way of implementing a function
> that has HoldAll, but it still evaluates each of its arguments exactly
> once (and does not go into infinite evaluation)?
>
> I can come up with some ways (explicitly checking whether evaluation
> changes the arguments), but neither of them are particularly elegant.
>
> The function should evaluate like this:
>
> Attributes[f] === {HoldAll}
> f[] --> f[]
> f[3] --> f[3]
> f[1+2] --> f[3]
> f[1,2] --> f[1,2]
> f[0+1,1+1] --> f[1,2]
> etc.
>
>
> Let me explain my motivation for asking this seemingly absurd question
> with an example:
>
> One built-in function that has this behaviour is And[]. This special
> behaviour was needed to make And[] a "short-circuiting" function: it
> evaluates the arguments one by one, and it returns False *immediately*
> when one argument evaluates to False, without evaluating any further
> arguments.
>
> Szabolcs
>