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Re: Subscript[x,

• To: mathgroup at smc.vnet.net
• Subject: [mg104073] Re: Subscript[x,
• From: danl at wolfram.com
• Date: Sun, 18 Oct 2009 05:26:40 -0400 (EDT)
• References: <hb9jt6$ke$1@smc.vnet.net> <200910171103.HAA13239@smc.vnet.net>

>  "Nasser M. Abbasi" <nma at 12000.org> wrote:
>
>> Before, I used to use Clear["Global`*] to clear all variable, until I
>> just
>> found subscripted variable do not get cleared
>>
>> In[31]:= Remove["Global`*"]
>>
>> In[33]:= Subscript[a, 1] = 5
>>
>> In[34]:= Subscript[a, 1]
>> Out[34]= 5
>>
>> In[35]:= Clear["Global`*"]    --> now clear it
>>
>> In[36]:= Subscript[a, 1]
>> Out[36]= 5      ----> did not clear
>
>
>
> In related vein, I find the following long-standing behaviour to be
> irksome and illogical:
>
>
> In[1]:= Subscript[x, 1] = 3
>
> In[2]:= Clear[Subscript[x, 1]]
>
> Clear::ssym: Subscript[x, 1] is not a symbol or a string. >>
>
> To clear the subscript, you have to use Unset, which produces beeps if
> the Subscript[x,1] has not been assigned a value. All so messy.
>
> Why not just make Clear do what it is meant to do, or at least, make it
> do what people reasonably expect it will do?
>
> Cheers
>
> Colin
>

I have also run afoul of this, and found it to be a minor irretant. But I
don't think the "obvious" thing would be the right thing, and I am not
convinced it would be feasible within the current design of the language.

Unset is meant to undo Set/SetDelayed, and handles this as it ought. Clear
is meant to remove DownValues and the like. These are attached to symbols,
not toexpressions. I think this is quite appropriate, as it supports a
substantial portion of Mathematica programming. So invoking Clear on a
non-symbol is not going to manage what you have in mind.

Should it be extended to perform Unset on non-symbol expressions? I would
surmise that might have some unexpected side effects (this is a quick
guess and I have not thought it through in detail). It would certainly be
a bit weird to overload Clear to do what it normally does with symbols,
and something else with non-symbol expressions.

Daniel Lichtblau
Wolfram Research

• References:
  • Re: Subscript[x,1] value do not get cleared using Clear["Global`*"] but get removed using Remove["Global`*]
    • From: Colin Rose <colin@tri.org.au>