7.4 Virtual Strings

The module VirtualString contains procedures operating on virtual strings. Virtual strings are designed as a convenient way to combine strings, byte strings, atoms, integers and floats to compound strings without explicit concatenation and conversion.

IsVirtualString

{VirtualString.is +X ?B}

tests whether X is a virtual string. Virtual strings are defined recursively as the set of all integers, floats, atoms, strings, byte strings, and tuples with label '#' whose subtrees are virtual strings.

toString

{VirtualString.toString +V ?S}

converts a virtual string V to a string S.

The transformation is straightforward: Atoms (except nil and '#'), integers, floats and byte strings are transformed into strings using Atom.toString, Int.toString, Float.toString, and ByteString.toString respectively, where in numbers - is used instead of ~. A tuple with label '#' is transformed by concatenation of the transformed subtrees. Note that both nil and '#' denote the empty string.

The following relation holds for all virtual strings V1 and V2:

{VirtualString.toString V1#V2}
= {Append
   {VirtualString.toString V1}
   {VirtualString.toString V2}}

Thus, VirtualString.toString maps # homomorphically to Append.

toAtom

{VirtualString.toAtom +V ?A}

converts a virtual string V to an atom A.

This procedure can be defined as:

fun {VirtualString.toAtom V}
   {String.toAtom {VirtualString.toString V}}
end

toByteString

{VirtualString.toByteString +V ?ByteString}

converts a virtual string V to a byte string ByteString.

This procedure is a synonym of ByteString.make (which see).

length

{VirtualString.length +V ?I}

returns the length of a virtual string in characters. Can be defined as:

{Length {VirtualString.toString VI}

changeSign

{VirtualString.changeSign +V1 X ?V2}

returns a virtual string derived from V1 where all occurrences of the unary minus sign for integers and floats are replaced by X.


Denys Duchier, Leif Kornstaedt and Christian Schulte
Version 1.4.0 (20080702)