Frank Heckenbach wrote:
Waldek Hebisch wrote:
Do we really need qualified identifiers here? (BTW, by QI I normally mean InterfaceName.RoutineName which makes no sense here. I suppose you mean ObjectType.MethodName.) Do other compilers support them? AIUI, Peter Schorn tried them only because GPC didn't support plain method names.
I have added them mostly for consistency -- since such names are legal in other contexts forbiding them here would create irregularity. They add a little extra functionlity: if the method name is shadowed qualified name still can reach the method.
OTOH, I consider it a deprecated feature as it has all the disadvantages of a nonlocal goto, both WRT implementation and program readability, so I'm not sure we should add functionality except what's required for compatibility. (Without it, it's not really a serious limitation, as one can always rename local subroutines without global effects.)
I have pretty strong opinion that consistency is important. However I do not think this feature is worth long disscusion: it is just a little piece of syntatic sugar which is rarely needed. I prefer to do it "right" (if at all). OTOH if you insist the we should not add qualified (dotted) names here I will remove this part.