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History of Macros

Метки: python

The macro has a long history, but most people will probably have had experience with C preprocessor macros. The problems with C macros were (1) they were in a different language (not C) and (2) the behavior was sometimes bizarre, and often inconsistent with the behavior of the rest of C.

Both Java and C# have added annotations, which allow you to do some things to elements of the language. Both of these have the problems that (1) to do what you want, you sometimes have to jump through some enormous and untenable hoops, which follows from (2) these annotation features have their hands tied by the bondage-and-discipline (or as Martin Fowler gently puts it: “Directing”) nature of those languages.

In a slightly different vein, many C++ programmers (myself included) have noted the generative abilities of C++ templates and have used that feature in a macro- like fashion.

Many other languages have incorporated macros, but without knowing much about it I will go out on a limb and say that Python decorators are similar to Lisp macros in power and possibility.