Extending Functionality: gen_server_ext

[Chris Pressey]

On Fri, 21 Mar 2003 12:31:32 +0100
Matthias Lang <matthias@REDACTED> wrote:

> 
>     martin> While the ideas that are expressed in this thread are
>     martin> quite interesting and have much merit I think that they
>     martin> would serve to undermine erlangs greatest strength -
>     martin> simplicity.
> 
>   vlad> What we are talking about here about extendig Erlang, is 
>   vlad> not really about the language, but about OTP. 
> 
> Changing the meaning of a function call is not about changing OTP. It
> is changing the language. You can no longer be sure that the code
> executed by a call to foo:bar() can be found in the module foo.
> 
> That is a big new uncertainty.
> 
> Matthias

Is it really so new?

  -module(foo).
  bar() -> baz:quuz().

i.e.:

1. you can't design a language which disallows spaghetti.
2. the more powerful a language feature, the easier it makes spaghetti.
3. when you introduce a new feature that makes spaghetti easier, you
should probably make a note of that lest it looks like you're encouraging
it.

Other than that... I do agree that Erlang is, if not simple, then
straightforward, and any proposed extension that doesn't meet a sort of
common straightforwardness criterion will likely not be adopted.

-Chris