eighty-twenty

John Shutt’s PhD thesis introduces the Kernel programming language. Kernel includes an $if, which is treated as a built-in primitive.

It doesn’t have to be primitive, though: in Kernel a construct that does the same thing as the primitive $if operation (in well-typed programs) can be constructed.

In Scheme, one needs to make use of the macro facility to construct an if if there’s not one built-in:

(define true (lambda (first second) first))
(define false (lambda (first second) second))
(define-syntax if
  (syntax-rules ()
    ((_ test if-true if-false)
     ((test (lambda () if-true) (lambda () if-false))))))

In Kernel, we use fexprs instead:

($define! true ($lambda (first second) first))
($define! false ($lambda (first second) second))
($define! $if
  ($vau (test if-true if-false) env
    (eval ((eval test env) if-true if-false) env)))

Here we can see the central opposition between Scheme and Kernel: Scheme’s evaluation of forms is implicit, and we use lambda to postpone evaluation; Kernel’s evaluation of forms is explicit, and we use eval to cause evaluation.

Expressions used as tests absolutely must evaluate to true or false, and nothing else, for these definitions to work. One of the benefits of treating $if as primitive is that one can provide for a separation between Booleans and the rest of the universe that’s not possible otherwise. It’s nice to know, though, that $if can be dispensed with if necessary.