Re: [Caml-list] Troublesome nodes

[Dario Teixeira <darioteixeira@yahoo.com>]

Hi,

> I was going to suggest boxing every node in an ordinary variant type with a
> single private constructor:
> 
>   type 'a t = private Node of 'a constraint 'a = [< Node.super_node_t ]

Thanks for the suggestion, Jon.  Boxing every node is actually very
welcome anyway, because later I would like to classify nodes into two
different classes, "Basic" and "Complex" (these are orthogonal to the
existing link/nonlink distinction), and the only way I see of doing this
is via some phantom type trickery (more on that in a later message).

Anyway, going back to your boxing suggestion, how can it actually be
applied to the signature of the Node module?  As you can see below, I
have define type 'a t (without the "Node" constructor -- is it really
necessary?), but what is the syntax for saying that the constructors
text, bold, see, and mref, return a kind of 'a t without breaking the
existing restrictions?

module rec Node:
sig
        type nonlink_node_t = [ `Text of string | `Bold of Node.super_node_t list ]
        type link_node_t = [ `See of string | `Mref of string * nonlink_node_t list ]
        type super_node_t = [ nonlink_node_t | link_node_t ]
        type 'a t = private 'a constraint 'a = [< super_node_t ]

        val text: string -> [> nonlink_node_t]
        val bold: [< super_node_t] list -> [> nonlink_node_t]
        val see: string -> [> link_node_t]
        val mref: string -> nonlink_node_t list -> [> link_node_t]
end =


Sorry for the stream of questions.  As you may have noticed, this
thread has gone deep into uncharted territory as far as the Ocaml
documentation goes.  In fact, I have the feeling the only existing
documentation for these subjects lies within the collective wisdom of
the people on this list...

Best regards,
Dario Teixeira



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