require/load as part of the syntax

[markburns]

This comment #18 (comment) made me think that it would be awesome to have some way of pulling in other streem files inline.
Maybe something like method_missing would look on the file system. Or an explicit syntax for pulling streems in so they could be preloaded.

#main.stm
STDIN | %x{split_into_lines} | map %x{match_today} | STDOUT

#split_into_lines.stm
STDIN.split("\n") | STDOUT

#match_today.stm
STDIN.match Date.today | STDOUT

or with method missing style

STDIN | split_into_lines | map match_today | STDOUT

[markburns]

Actually having written those examples and forgotten STDIN STDOUT for some of them I also think they should be implicit

[jstoja]

+1 they should be implicit !

[matz]

I think you should be able to abstract part of stream in a form of a function, e.g.

def split_into_lines {
  current.split("\n")
}
def match_today {
  current.match(Date.today)
}
STDIN | split_into_lines | match_today | STDOUT

I am not sure if proposed process model fit well in the language.

[nickserv]

@matz I agree, I like the idea of making STDIN and STDOUT at least somewhat explicit so that it's easier to abstract over streams. Something like STDIN | main | STDOUT could be used as the equivalent of a main function.

[markburns]

@matz obviously this example is trivial and is more suited to your abstraction. For the file loading stuff I was thinking of more complex/larger pieces of code.

@nicolasmccurdy would there be a problem with having it implicit as well as optionally explicit?

[alexispurslane]

Personally, I like the %x{file-to-load} syntax best, because it is fairly concise, knows exactly which file to load, and isn't completely implicit. Although I do thing a more obvious, less strange syntax, such as {{file-to-load}} would be better. And functions would still be possible. This isn't a mutually exclusive thing.

[shuichiro-makigaki]

I think we need 'stream processing function' definition as @matz says. In addition, the namespace concept should be defined such as class, package or namespace. import statement may be useful because it's intuitive.
Anyway, basically I also would like to add +1 to @markburns.