[PD-dev] [ pure-data-Bugs-1776553 ] Message boxes seem to behave inconsistently

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Bugs item #1776553, was opened at 2007-08-17 22:02
Message generated for change (Comment added) made by sistisette
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Category: puredata
Group: None
Status: Open
Resolution: None
Priority: 5
Private: No
Submitted By: r jacobs (rnjacobs)
Assigned to: Nobody/Anonymous (nobody)
Summary: Message boxes seem to behave inconsistently

Initial Comment:
I don't know whether this is an actual bug, but it is a strange inconsistency. In using PD 0.40-2 in the Debian archive, the attached patch (three message boxes, containing a list "1 2 3", an anything "a b c", and "$1 $2") produces the output

r: 1 2 3
p: 1 2
r: a b c
p: b c

I assume the reason the last line is "b c" instead of "a b" is because the message box sees that the input is an anything and interprets "a" as a type. But "a" isn't a type, so there is no way to get the first element of an anything using a message box (yes, i could use an unpack, so there's definitely workarounds).

Is this a bug?

Thank you!

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Comment By: Matteo Sisti Sette (sistisette)
Date: 2007-08-18 16:14

Message:
Logged In: YES 
user_id=1709568
Originator: NO

No, the behaviour is correct (or at least, consistent).

In the message [a b c(, "a" is the "message identifier" (not sure the
terminology I'm using is correct)... that's what you call the "type", but
it need not be a type (such as symbol float or list). So b and c are the
first and second arguments. "a" is not an argument.

If you want to get the first element (i.e. the identifier) you need to
convert the anything message into a list, so that the identifier is
converted into the first argument, i.e.:

[a b c(
|
[list]    <-- this outputs "list a b c"
|
[$1 $2(


Hope this helped.


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