[PD] (breaking symbols) was Re: find a list of numbers in a text file

[Jonathan Wilkes]

----- Original Message -----
> From: Mathieu Bouchard <matju at artengine.ca>
> To: Jonathan Wilkes <jancsika at yahoo.com>
> Cc: Chris McCormick <chris at mccormick.cx>; Miller Puckette <msp at ucsd.edu>; "pd-list at iem.at" <pd-list at iem.at>
> Sent: Sunday, September 4, 2011 1:48 PM
> Subject: Re: [PD] (breaking symbols) was Re: find a list of numbers in a text file
> 
> On Sat, 3 Sep 2011, Jonathan Wilkes wrote:
> 
>>  It needs to be that simple for the general case because Pd Vanilla has no 
> (sensible) mechanism to convert a symbol atom into a float.
> 
> Then it needs a sensible mechanism to convert a symbol atom into a float.

Yes, it does.  But if there were one, it'd still be nice to have the default be float 
atoms come out, and maybe a flag or a different creator name for outputting all 
symbols. (Like [symbol explode]?)

> 
>>  If symbol atoms which look like numbers to the naked eye are going to start 
> flying around more freely in Pd then the docs need to explain how atoms are a 
> kind of weird file cabinet where the label on the cabinet tells you which 
> file-folder inside actually holds the data.
> 
> That's called a union or a variant record type or an «any» type or a 
> sum-type or whatever else.
> 
> If it looks weird and/or difficult, it's because it's not taught in a 
> way that makes it understood as normal.

I think the problem is it's not explicitly taught at all.

> 
>>  Also, I'm assuming [list implode] would accept and process a list at 
> the left inlet, unlike [s2l] (which passes the 1st element to the right inlet).
> 
> I don't understand. Wouldn't [list implode] correspond to [l2s], whereas 
> [list explode] would correspond to [s2l].

That's right, I wrote the wrong one.  I have a bad habit of getting opposites 
mixed up-- if I'm not careful I'll create a [max] to output the greater of two numbers.

> 
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>