Method Overload Support In Wiki Talk

Summary

A discussion about the pros and cons of adding support for overloaded methods in WikiTalk

I've inadvertently started a discussion about adding method overload support to WikiTalk. To get the most visibility for this topic and to get as much feedback from the community as possible I thought I'd transfer it from the FlexWikiMailingList to here.

CraigAndera

While this appeals to me as a C# programmer, any time the idea comes of adding more complexity to what has to already be the most complex wiki syntax on the face of the planet, I get a little leery. Unfortunately, I don't feel like I have anything like the language design knowledge required to make the "right" decision. My uneducated gut feel is that default parameters are a pretty simple concept, and the complexity of the language is not significantly increased by adding support for them. Full-on support for overload resolution would potentially be complicated to support, but I think adding a few restrictions (e.g. no support for resolving method bindings in the face of even slight ambiguity) would make it much simpler.

DerekLakin

Like you, the idea of having support in WikiTalk for overloaded methods is very appealing to me. From a cursory glance over the code it looks like something would need to be done to extend the key for the hashtable of available methods as this seems to be the main barrier to supporting overloads, but obviously we'd need to get David to comment on how easy it would be. Equally I think that the wiki syntax is already pretty complicated and adding method overloads isn't going to make it simpler.

If anyone else has any comments/thoughts/suggestions/etc please feel free to contribute to the discussion.

DavidOrnstein

Actually, good news: WikiTalk includes support optional parameters already. This is mentioned a bit in WikiTalkMember, though perhaps not in much depth. I've added a few additional notes at OptionalWikiTalkParameters.

DerekLakin

This sounds perfect! I'll take a look tomorrow and see how I get on. Thanks David

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