GNU bug report logs - #7146
(make-symbol "") issues

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Package: emacs;

Reported by: Frank <some.frank <at> gmail.com>

Date: Sat, 2 Oct 2010 12:36:02 UTC

Severity: minor

Tags: fixed

Fixed in version 24.1

Done: Lars Magne Ingebrigtsen <larsi <at> gnus.org>

Bug is archived. No further changes may be made.

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From: Chong Yidong <cyd <at> stupidchicken.com>
To: Frank <some.frank <at> gmail.com>
Cc: 7146 <at> debbugs.gnu.org
Subject: bug#7146: (make-symbol "") issues
Date: Sun, 03 Oct 2010 10:55:17 -0400

Johan Bockgård <bojohan <at> gnu.org> writes:

> The problem is that there is no read syntax for a symbol with an empty
> name, so it can't reliably be printed to a string (file) and read back.
>
>   (symbol-name (aref [#: x] 0)) => "x" ; This is what happens in the report.
>
>   but (symbol-name (aref [#:] 0)) => ""
>
> You could change the reader to somehow recognize the first case. The
> problem would come back if you changed `make-symbol' to `intern',
> though, since it really prints as nothing at all.

I guess we could make intern and make-symbol signal errors for the empty
string.
This bug report was last modified 13 years and 299 days ago.

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