• Yuxuan Shui (28/28) Sep 13 2016 When I tried to use UFCS to call a nested function, I was

Yuxuan Shui <yshuiv7 gmail.com> writes:

When I tried to use UFCS to call a nested function, I was 
surprised that it didn't work. Then I looked up the document, and 
found out this is actually by design. However, I found the reason 
listed in the document very unconvincing.

I will copy the example here:

int front(int[] arr) { return arr[0]; }

void main()
{
     int[] a = [1,2,3];
     auto x = a.front();   // call .front by UFCS

     auto front = x;       // front is now a variable
     auto y = a.front();   // Error, front is not a function
}

class C
{
     int[] arr;
     int front()
     {
         return arr.front(); // Error, C.front is not callable
                             // using argument types (int[])
     }
}

Looks like all of these examples can be resolved by just letting 
the compiler keep trying the next symbol after the first one 
failed, just like doing an overload resolution. So what's the 
problem with doing that?

Also can't the compiler simply lower a.name to name(a) if 'name' 
is not found in 'a', then compile that?