[erlang-questions] data sharing is outside the semantics of Erlang, but it sure is useful

[Zoltan Lajos Kis]

Michael Turner wrote:
> It seems that James is interested in data structure sharing IN THIS
> PARTICULAR CASE because it gives him a kind of data compression.  Again,
> if that's the goal, why is ordinary data compression *not* the answer
> here?  If compression isn't the goal, what did I miss about the
> (implicit) problem statement, to which sharing semantics in Erlang *is*
> the answer?
>
> -michael turner
>
>   
A bit of analogy, but this is like suggesting that creating a symlink to 
a file, is not different from copying the file, and then tar.gz'ing the two.
The result might be the same space-wise, but there are certain 
differences in usability...

Z.