[erlang-questions] Strings - deprecated functions

[lloyd@REDACTED]

Hi Kostis,
 
This thread has explored the policy of deprecating and dropping functions from the string library. Arguments have been made for and against. The term "cstring" was mentioned in a post long gone by. Perhaps it is not a technical term in any language, and I have inadvertently introduced confusion.  But I take cstring to mean a list of ASCII characters.
 
The suggestion in my previous post was aimed at finding a way to move forward with strong support for Unicode while maintaining a clear distinction between the new Unicode string functions and the currently deprecated string functions.
 
We all agree, I believe, that we'd rather not have a language cluttered up with functions that were once useful but have fallen behind advancing technology.
 
And some posts in this thread contend that the deprecated string functions fall into this category. Thus, they favor a policy that deprecates them and marks them for eventual elimination from the language.
 
The devil in the details here is the word "eventual."
 
But I argue that the currently deprecated functions will be useful as long as the English language is widely used around the world. So why not find a way to clearly distinguish between the deprecated string functions and the Unicode functions without breaking legacy code?
 
Since at this time, I'm guessing, that there is more code in the wild that incorporate the deprecated functions than the Unicode functions, then putting the Unicode functions in a separate module may impose less of a burden on the community.
 
Plus, if and when , if ever, there is strong consensus that the deprecated string functions are of little use to anybody in the Erlang user community, the module as a whole can be dropped from Erlang.
 
Best wishes,
 
Lloyd
 
 
 
 
-----Original Message-----
From: "Kostis Sagonas" <kostis@REDACTED>
Sent: Saturday, November 25, 2017 10:11am
To: erlang-questions@REDACTED
Subject: Re: [erlang-questions] Strings - deprecated functions



On 11/25/2017 04:00 PM, Lloyd R. Prentice wrote:
> 
>  I don't have time to check if Erlang has a cstring type, but if not, 
> create it.


What _exactly_ is a cstring and what does it have to do with Erlang?

Kostis
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