[Glass] Differences between Symbol/String #= in Pharo and GemStone

[jtuchel at objektfabrik.de]

Am 09.12.13 07:09, schrieb itlists at schrievkrom.de:
>
> Pharo:
>
> 'aaa' asSymbol -> #aaa
> #aaa = 'aaa' -> true
> This seems to be a very strange result
>
> Marten
Hi Marten,

that also was my first thought. But thinking about it, the difference in 
class between a Symbol and a String is quite technical, so you can argue 
that #aaa and 'aaa' are equal. They represent the same sequence of 
characters, even if, technically, a Symbol is only a unique name for an 
entry in some special list.
Still this behavior is not the default outside of Pharo, and as Dale 
says, it's not standards compliant.

So Mariano, I guess you should try and find another solution. I guess 
neither String nor Symbol are the best possible choices as Dictionary 
keys if you want to do fast and *unique* lookups, even if that sounds 
strange for Symbols... What exactly was your intention for Symbols? I 
guess it was guaranteed uniqueness, right?

Joachim

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