[cells-devel] CVS Clean-up

[Thomas F. Burdick]

Kenny Tilton writes:
 > OK, the Cells CVS repository has been cleaned up and I am on the verge 
 > of making my first changes to Cells, so (a) beware and (b) anyone with a 
 > standalone tarball will soon be diverging from the official code.

Well, the released code, anyway.  I think the moral of the story is:
version 2.1 is coming in the not-too-distant future.

 > My first change will be an oddity: ephemeral cells, when reset, do not 
 > get the corresponding slot value reset. I have not made this change yet, 
 > so maybe it was that way for a reason? Hard to imagine.

I have a vague memory of talking about this, but I don't remember why.
Either way, it only affects the non-cells view of the object, right?

 > Second will be repairing the damage done to Synapses. Well, overall the 
 > change was good, it just broke Synapses. I am starting to see how the 
 > same change done properly will simplify Cells a little:
 > 
 > Synapses always had two rules: should I fire, and what value should I 
 > pass along? Normal Cells only had the "what value?" rule, with a 
 > hard-coded (kinda) test "has it changed?" to decide whether or not to 
 > fire. The default changed test EQL could be overridden, but that was it.

I really should remember to use this feature sometime.  I think the
name "synapse" is too clever for me: I never remember what it means,
and end out not using them where they're appropriate.

 > In the change that broke Synapses, I simply eliminated Synapses as a 
 > separate data structure and implemented them with Cell structures, the 
 > fire test and value rules being combined in one lambda for the Cell 
 > value rule. Goofy mistake since the standard Cell was still being 
 > controlled by the "unchanged" rule.
 > 
 > So the Deep Fix will be to meet half-way, and now enhance standard Cells 
 > to work like Synapses, by moving the "unchanged" test into a "fire?" 
 > mechanism. This is not the unification of Gravity with Electromagnetism, 
 > but it should simplify the code some.

Sounds good.  Hey, if it's available as a keyword option to c-formula,
I might actually see it and use it :-)