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Date: Tue, 21 May 2013 10:25:08 +0200
From: Alain Frisch <alain@frisch.fr>
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To: Dario Teixeira <darioteixeira@yahoo.com>, 
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Subject: Re: [Caml-list] The rec/nonrec debate

On 05/20/2013 04:31 PM, Dario Teixeira wrote:
> The unrecursiveness of type declarations is cause for some chagrin, as a
> recent ticket on Mantis demonstrates [1].

As I explain on this Mantis ticket, I don't believe that the implicit 
recursiveness of type declarations is the real cause of the problem. 
The same problem would still exist if the type declarations were 
non-recursive by default or if we add a "nonrec" modifier.  Consider:


   type t = X | Y

   module M = struct
      type t = A | B

      type s = {
       foo: (* I cannot refer to the outer "t" *);
       bar: t
      }
   end

What's missing, in my opinion, is not really a way to control 
recursiveness of type declarations, but rather to refer to components 
from outer scopes.


Alain