Re: [RFA]: BOOL coding standards (Was: Problemwith+numberWithBool:?)

[Richard Frith-Macdonald]

On 3 Feb 2004, at 15:38, Alexander Malmberg wrote:

> Nicola Pero wrote:
> > > > The Objective-C manual of NeXTstep 3.3 clearly states -
> > > >
> > > > [snip
> > > > BOOL A boolean value, either YES or NO"
> > > >
> > > > This precise definition
> > > [snip]
> > >
> > > This isn't anywhere close to being a precise definition!
> >
> > To me, it's clear enough what it means.  It means a BOOL is meant to 
> > be
> > either YES or NO. :-)
>
> Sure, to you, but that's because you choose to read that into the
> statement, not because it says so. :)

Come on, stop trying to con Nicola into believing he can't read english 
:-)

Seriously ... the language is perfectly clear and you can't accuse 
him/me of
reading anything into it.

Whether it was *meant* to be read literally/naively is another matter,
and you could be right in thinking that the authors intended another
meaning informed by a background of C programming ...
In fact, out of a spirit of academic interest (it really has no bearing 
on
the discussion) I emailed Brad Cox to ask what the original intention
was,  but haven't had a reply yet :-(

If we want to argue about whether BOOL should me implemented as
a true boolean or not, we should be discussing the merits of the case,
not the intentions of the author of a spec ... I'm sorry I got 
sidetracked
into answering Helge's assertion about the spec to begin with - it
really is not helpful.