[Scl] Re: Report on Common Logic

[John F. Sowa]

Bill,

Welcome back.

Re Afghanistan:  Is it true that you were no longer getting
combat pay because it was now considered an R & R spot rather
than a war zone?  I can understand that our fearless leader
needs to reduce expenses so he can give more tax breaks
to his campaign donors.

Re seqvars:  I'm not against them, as long as the formal
definition doesn't obscure everything else.  I don't want
Ian or anybody else coming up with an alternative semantics
that is substantially simpler just because it lacks some
of the goodies of SCL.

I agree with Chris's point:

 > The trick is not to clobber seqvars but to clearly indicate
 > that they are an *optional* feature of the framework.  Most
 > people are smart enough not to be turned off by features
 > they can easily ignore for their own purposes.  We are
 > striving for both power *and* flexibility.

I am happy with that, as long as we can make the presentation
clear, simple, readable, and convincing.  There is always the
alternative of including an ontology for sequences.  That is
what Z does:  sequences are not in the core, but they are in
the "workbench", which includes an ontology for sets, bags,
sequences, and integers.

I have never heard a clear argument for putting seqvars
in the core instead of an extension that also includes an
ontology for sequences.

John