From @purd|e@@ @end|ng |rom gm@||@com  Sun Dec  6 03:43:17 2020
From: @purd|e@@ @end|ng |rom gm@||@com (Abby Spurdle)
Date: Sun, 6 Dec 2020 15:43:17 +1300
Subject: [Rd] New pipe operator
In-Reply-To: <e55c2093-0bb5-5f9b-5521-0ca8bdf35953@gmail.com>
References: <e55c2093-0bb5-5f9b-5521-0ca8bdf35953@gmail.com>
Message-ID: <CAB8pepzDHvM+JJtOcSOudyJ0Fe6-Yk2sG7Ep7qDkOK52bcuwZw@mail.gmail.com>

> This is a good addition

I can't understand why so many people are calling this a "pipe".
Pipes connect processes, via their I/O streams.
Arguably, a more general interpretation would include sockets and files.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pipeline_(Unix)
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Named_pipe
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Anonymous_pipe

As far as I can tell, the magrittr-like operators are functions (not
pipes), with nonstandard syntax.
This is not consistent with R's original design philosophy, building
on C, Lisp and S, along with lots of *important* math and stats.

It's possible that some parties are interested in creating a kind of
"data pipeline".
I'm interested in this myself, and I think we could discuss this more.
But I'm not convinced the magrittr-like operators help to achieve this goal.
Which, in my opinion, would require one to model programs as directed
graphs, along with some degree of asynchronous input.

Presumably, these operators will be added to R anyway, and (almost) no
one will listen to me.

So, I would like to make one suggestion:
Is it possible for these operators to *not* be named:
    The R Pipe
    The S Pipe
    Or anything with a similar meaning.

Maybe tidy pipe, or something else that links it to its proponents?



[Rd] New pipe operator
Abby Spurdle