Comments on JDK-8198408 please ?

[John Rose]

On Feb 26, 2018, at 4:50 PM, Maurizio Cimadamore <maurizio.cimadamore at oracle.com> wrote:
> 
>>> 
>>> I think for now it's better to start simple - only one level allowed and no complex expressions in the selector allowed.
>> 
>> I don't think there is really a technical reason for this; but of course is there is one,
>> make it simpler by restricting the construct.
> I agree there's no technical reason to have the restriction - and I did not propose the restriction because of that - I was only putting that restriction forward to allow for a 'staged' prototype - e.g. we can start simple, and add more complex forms as we go, and as we see fit.
> 
> And no - I did not want an implicit write-back - if user wants writeback it should do that explicitly:
> 
> A a = _WithField(a.x, 11);

Got it!  Although I think you didn't mean to make a declaration only?

A a = …;
a = __WithField(a.x, 11);

— John

P.S. And if we get reconstructor expressions, then such expressions
would sugar up to something very vaguely like and yet unlike:

b = a __Recon-> x = 10;  // a unchanged, b gets new version of a
a = a __Recon-> x = 11;  // a gets new version of itself
a __Recon->= x = 11;  // same as prev
a = a __Recon-> x++;  // now a.x = 12
a = a __Recon-> { x = 13; unlucky = true; log("shark jumped"); };

(The reconstructor bodies set fields in exactly the same sense that
constructors set blank final fields, except that reconstructors also
provide the previous values of those fields in the previous version
of the receiver.  If it is further aligned with constructor bodies, it
can call methods ont the current object, like "log" above.)