Macaulay2 / Macaulay2/M2

packages sharing immutable symbols without values

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Dominant language
Macaulay2
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435
Forks
297
Avg merge
4d 20h
Merged PRs (30d)
11

Description

Many packages introduce immutable symbols with capitalized names to use as names of optional arguments, and there is no reason such things need to be private to the package (they don't get values assigned). Perhaps we should add another dictionary to the path for symbols in common use, shared by packages, and ensure that the user gets a new warning when exporting such symbols that shadow another. There would be a variant of "export" called "exportShared" that puts such symbols into that new dictionary for all to share, or gets it from there, if it's already there.

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Research direction

Start by tracing how package paths, immutable symbols, and the existing "export" operation are represented. Define the scope of the shared dictionary and the proposed "exportShared" variant, including the warning for shadowing; done requires an agreed design and implementation covering these cases.

Written by the indexing model from the issue text.

Assessment

Domain
compilers
Issue type
Feature
Difficulty
5/5
Estimated time
Over a week
Activity status
Stale
Clarity
Needs clarification
Newbie friendliness
25/100

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