WISH: compact construction syntax for vector types

[Oldes]

As we don't have any syntax for vector and its variants, I think it would be nice to enhance construction syntax a little bit, to support short vector variant creation.

For example:

>> #[ui8! 3]
== make vector! [unsigned integer! 8 3 [0 0 0]]
>> #[si16! [1 2 3]]
== make vector! [integer! 16 3 [1 2 3]]

Supported numeric types could be:

si8!
si16!
si32!
si64!

ui8!
ui16!
ui32!
ui64!

f32!
f64!

[jankom]

Can I ask what you use vectors for in Rebol? Absolutely not that I think they aren't usefull, but I haven't thought of using them so far with Rebol and am just interested?

Does r3 have special block types like #[ ] ?

The solution of just having a function like a "vector" function like vector 'ui32 [ 1 2 3 ] is not OK because you want to create them directly from loader, not a block that is then loaded into vector at runtime?

[Oldes]

At this moment I'm using vectors for sound processing and before I used them in graphics too. #[] is construction syntax... usually used with save/all and mold/all to save data in serialized format without losing index.

>> mold next "123"
== {"23"}

>> mold/all next "123"
== {#[string! "123" 2]}

[Oldes]

I know, that it is just a cosmetic thing, but why not to have it, when it was so cheap to add. My goal is to do 3D from Rebol one day, and I think, that code:

cam-Position: #[f32! [4.0 3.0 3.0]] ;Camera is at (4,3,3), in World Space
cam-Target:   #[f32! [0.0 0.0 0.0]] ;and looks at the origin
cam-Head:     #[f32! [0.0 1.0 0.0]] ;Head is up

looks better than:

cam-Position: make vector! [decimal! 32 [4.0 3.0 3.0]] ;Camera is at (4,3,3), in World Space
cam-Target:   make vector! [decimal! 32 [0.0 0.0 0.0]] ;and looks at the origin
cam-Head:     make vector! [decimal! 32 [0.0 1.0 0.0]] ;Head is up

Of course I can use helper functions.