[erlang-questions] how to quelch lc warnings?

[Richard Carlsson]

ok wrote:
> Isn't this stuff about list comprehensions with no generator distracting
> us from the original application of the idea?  It was something like
> 
> 	[X || X /= []] ++ [Y || Y /= []] ++ [Z || Z /= []]
> 
> which can be written easily as a list comprehension WITH a generator:
> 
> 	[T | T <- [X,Y,Z], T /= []]
> 
> This way does require the invention of a name (T), but to me it is
> more intention-revealing (I want those of X, Y, Z that are not empty
> lists collected as a list) and avoids the repeated /= [] test.

Ulf's short example was a bit misleading in this way. What he was
really after was a compact conditional: do-this-unless-x-is-empty,
which used side effects instead of building a list. (Substitute a
comma for ++ above.)

I don't necessarily endorse the use of list comprehensions for
side effects, and would probably have used a macro instead:

   ?UNLESS(X =:= [],
           begin
             ...side effects...
           end),
   ?UNLESS(Y =:= [],
           ...

or just

   if X =/= [] ->
        ...side effects...;
      true ->
        ok
   end,
   ...

but Ulf said that he sort of liked the layout he got with LC:s (and I
agree that it gets rid of distracting tokens like if/->/end/true/ok.)

     /Richard