On Mon, Mar 19, 2012 at 11:22 AM, Milan Mimica <milan.mimica@gmail.com> wrote:

On 18 March 2012 23:20, Guillermo Polito <guillermopolito@gmail.com> wrote:
Hmm, you can compile a method with Behavior>>#compile:notifying:

and send an observer implementing:

#notify:at:in:

and some other stuff like #selection #deselect...

That way you can capture the errors...

This almost works.
It doesn't raise errors for undeclared variables, instead it prompts for variable replacement.

| method requestor |

requestor := Mock new.
(requestor stub: #selectionInterval) returns: (1 to: 2).
requestor stub: #selectFrom:to:.
(requestor stub: #bindingOf:) returns: nil.
(requestor stub: #notify:at:in:) will: [ self halt ].

method := Compiler new compiledMethodFor: 'a:=1' in: nil to: nil notifying: requestor proxy ifFail: nil logged: false.
method inspect

I would like to catch the error. It is an error, right?

the answer is "not necessarily". �Smalltalk deals with circular references between globals in source by using Undeclared. �So if the source of class A references class B and vice verse, and they are filed-in one after another, when class A's source is compiled, a reference to B will be created in undeclared. �When B's source is compiled, that Undeclared binding will be moved to Smalltalk and updated to reference class B.

So one could say in non-interactive use

a) compiling source containing an undeclared reference merits only a warning

b) compiling source containiing an undeclared reference in the form of a variable beginning with lower-case is an error, since globals should be capitalized

c) force classes to be defined before their source is compiled

IMO, it's not an error, and a) is a good option. �Note that if you did make it an error in all circumstances you'd badly break the system.

--�

Milan Mimica