Re: What's missing in ELisp that makes people want to use cl-lib?

[João Távora]

On Wed, Jan 3, 2024 at 4:11 AM Richard Stallman <rms@gnu.org> wrote:

> The distinction could be a matter of whether it uses cl-loop features
> that are less frequently used.  Or perhaps how MANY cl-loop features
> are used.

Whatever becomes of this (sorry Richard, I hope not much), I do hope
this doesn't go into the byte-compiler proper, but some special
linter.  Give this special linter the ability to detect lisp sexps
trees deeper than a given threshold or longer than a certain number
of lines.  That's likely much simpler to agree on and implement.

Make this linter optional, like M-x checkdoc.

> (There is no need to try to make this precise or quibble
> about the details.)

Of course there is.  cl-loop users should be consulted about
which features they use to make something happen concisely
and readably.

What you're proposing amounts to making that linter mostly
ignorant about exactly what makes cl-loop useful. A linter that
flags a construct and can't suggest a universally accepted better
alternative -- like the byte-compiler does today -- is just
unneeded nuisance.

I'll be very clear: It's totally legitimate for the maintainers
to decide these kinds of things if they think it's better, and if
this were a paid job I might go along with it out of necessity,
but it isn't so i'd just stop pushing to any repo that starts
enforcing this kind of stuff, wish you all good luck and no hard
feelings.

João