document the history of blank identifier to ignore values
Delta456 opened this issue · 4 comments
I think its necessary to know and research why _
was specifically chosen as the identifier to ignore values as Go was the first one to adopt it.
The blank identifier was introduced in golang/go@4e56b33.
The language spec states the reason why it was chosen:
The blank identifier provides a convenient way to ignore values returned by a multi-valued expression [...]
Go is not the first programming language that adopts it. I know the blank identifier way back from Python 2.6, giving the fact that Python 2.6 was released in 2008 and the change of Go was in 2009.
So I do not think the blank identifier could get into the repo as a fascinating history. This seems like a likely decline. Leave one week for comments.
But _
is a valid identifier in Python i.e. you can use and change it. Go and other languages who have it treat them very specially unlike others.
It's just a matter of choice. The semantics are similar.
If you'd like to object the argument, you need to present more concrete reasons such as how a blank identifier is as interesting as the go
keyword.
No changes in consensus. Close.