On Sat, Apr 3, 2010 at 13:10, Robert Dodier <robert.dodier at gmail.com> wrote:
> The use of special variables in Maxima could be cleaned up a lot.
>
Agreed!
> I am imagining stuff like:
> change names to use the *foo* convention,
>
Sounds like a good idea and not risky (assuming we catch all instances of
the variable in one edit).
> replace special variables with lexical variables where possible,
>
Trickier and I think this will only cover a few cases -- the only case I can
think of where a lexical variable can simply replace a special variable
(assuming the special variable is really needed) is when there is a nested
function (lambda-expression). Of course, code can be reorganized in many
cases to eliminate special variables, but that requires more thought and
work....
> perhaps wider use of CL packages to isolate symbols used in different
> contexts.
>
Good idea in general, for functions as well as special variables.
-s