Re: [Chicken-hackers] [PATCH] Fix #1294 by mentioning in the docs that define-record-printer is not a definition

[Evan Hanson]

On 2019-06-30 19:25, Peter Bex wrote:
> I had another look at #1294 and decided that, while we *could* fake the
> record type printer as a definition by wrapping it in a (define) call
> with a gensym, I think it doesn't make much sense.

This actually makes good sense to me. Why don't you like this approach?

In any case, I think we should try to address the issue one way or the
other rather than keep a potential pitfall around. If we don't make it a
"real" (i.e. fake) definition, could we at least introduce a new name
and encourage its use? Perhaps `set-record-printer!', maybe even with a
SRFI 17 setter on the type descriptor? Unfortunately, we probably can't
remove the old name, since it comes from SRFI 99. But again, making it
an actual definition seems OK to me.

As a sidenote, this issue also applies to `define-reader-ctor', and
perhaps others; I didn't review the lot.

Evan