Subject: bug#56799: (gnu services configuration) usage of *unspecified* is problematic

From: Maxim Cournoyer <[email-masked]>
Date: Wed, 17 Aug 2022 09:16:17 -0400

Hi Attila,

Attila Lendvai <[email-masked]> writes:

>> > would you be fine if we renamed MAYBE-VALUE-SET? to UNSET-VALUE?
>>
>>
>> unset-value? sounds like an action; so I'd name it 'maybe-value-unset?';
>> but as I wrote above I don't really see the benefit/like the idea.
>
>
> it's always funny when two non-native speakers (?) argue about
> english... :) maybe we should invite one into the conversation?

Eh.  I'm not a native English speaker either (although living in North
America you can't really escape being exposed to it), but the naming
issue here seems logical rather than subjective to me: unset can be both
a verb or an adjective; by moving it after the noun, it communicates
better that it acts as an adjective rather than as a verb.

So instead of 'unset-value?', I'd use 'value-unset?', but since in this
case we're dealing with a 'maybe' type defined with the 'define-maybe'
macro, I'd keep 'maybe-value-unset?'.

I hope this makes sense.

Native English speakers are welcome to tip in, of course :-).

Thanks,

Maxim