int as bool

[Akuli]

I tried to do this:

        v = get_special_constant(expr->varname)
        if v != -1:
            return v as bool

where get_special_constant() always returns -1, 0, or 1. This doesn't work:

compiler error in file "self_hosted/evaluate.jou", line 23: cannot cast from type int to bool

IMO this should be possible. Sometimes foo as bool is more readable than foo != 0.

[Akuli]

It's been about 15 seconds since I posted the issue, and I no longer like this idea.

• It would lead to things like if strcmp(foo, bar) as bool: to check if strings differ. I think if strcmp(foo, bar) != 0 is somewhat less confusing: != looks like "not equal to" which is what it does.
• If we do this for numbers, it would be tempting to do this for pointers, but I like the explicit == NULL / != NULL that Jou forces me to write.