On 11/18/07, Vadim V. Zhytnikov <vvzhy at mail.ru> wrote:
> In many places in Maxima manual uses terms "atom" and "symbol".
> It is clear both these Maxima terms have Lisp origin and thus
> symbol stands for something which is usually called identifier
> in other computer languages. On the other hand atom is something
> more general and embraces symbols, strings and numbers (at least).
> But I see that in many-many places Maxima manual uses term atom
> in the context where actually is appropriate.
Without looking I don't know whether the terms atom, symbol,
and variable are used appropriately. I guess in general that
"variable" should be preferred as the term to indicate
algebraic indeterminates. But it sounds like this is a problem that
needs to be reviewed case by case.
> See for example recent new description of
> assignment operator in Operators.texi (Maxima CVS).
Well, when I wrote that I was attempting to be careful about the
distinction between simple variables and subscripted variables,
since Maxima does something interesting with the latter in assignment.
I'll take another look at it and see if it can't be clarified.
best
Robert