Re: [Caml-list] Changing precedence and placement of attributes

[Maxence Guesdon <Maxence.Guesdon@inria.fr>]

On Mon, 09 Mar 2015 12:27:19 +0100
Alain Frisch <alain.frisch@lexifi.com> wrote:

> Dear caml-list,

Hello,
> 
> Following a feature request by whitequark and a pull request by Jérémie 
> Dimino, we're considering two related changes to attributes:
> 
>   - Their precedence on type expressions, so that "int * int [@foo]" is 
> parsed as "(int * int) [@foo]" instead of "int * (int [@foo])".
> 
>   - Their placement on constructor/field declaration, so that one would 
> write "A of int [@foo]" or "a : int [@foo]" instead of "A [@foo] of int" 
> or "a [@foo] : int".
> 
> References:
> 
>   - http://caml.inria.fr/mantis/view.php?id=6612
>   - https://github.com/ocaml/ocaml/pull/152
> 
> There seems to be a strong support in favor of the change (at least, 
> nobody objected to it on principle).  But it can clearly break or change 
> the interpretation of existing code.  I'm still in favor of doing the 
> change as soon as possible.
> 
> So my question is:  would anyone be negatively impacted (or just 
> shocked) if the change was done as part of the next bug fix release 
> (4.02.2)?

I'm quite "shocked" as it becomes inconsistent with other precedences
in type definitions. By now
  int * int list
is parsed as
  int * (int list)
and not as
  (int * int) list

I would expect attributes to be associated the same way.

How would be parsed the following:
  int * int [@foo] * int
?

- m