Major Section: MISCELLANEOUS
Examples: user type-in form evaluated :pc 5 (ACL2::PC '5) :pcs app rev (ACL2::PCS 'app 'rev) :length (1 2 3) (ACL2::LENGTH '(1 2 3)) :quit (ACL2::QUIT) ; Note: avoid optional argument
When a keyword, :key, is read as a command, ACL2 determines whether the
symbol with the same name in the "ACL2" package, acl2::key, is a
function or simple macro of n arguments. If so, ACL2 reads n more
objects, obj1, ..., objn, and then acts as though it had read the
following form (for a given key):
(ACL2::key 'obj1 ... 'objn)Thus, by using the keyword command hack you avoid typing the parentheses, the
"ACL2" package name, and the quotation marks.See ld-keyword-aliases for how to customize this behavior.
Note the generality of this hack. Any function or macro in the "ACL2"
package can be so invoked, not just ``commands.'' Indeed, there is no such
thing as a distinguished class of commands. Users may take advantage of the
keyword command hack by defining functions and macros in the "ACL2"
package.
The one caveat is that when the keyword hack is used to invoke a macro, only
the required arguments for that macro are read before calling that macro:
none of the &optional, &rest, &body, or &key arguments are
read for that call. The macro is thus called with only its required
arguments. The following log illustrates this caveat.
ACL2 !>:set-iprint t ACL2 Query (:SET-IPRINT): Action (T, NIL, RESET, RESET-ENABLE, SAME, Q or ?): ACL2 Observation in SET-IPRINT: Iprinting has been enabled. ACL2 !>What happened? First, the command
:set-iprint was read. Since the macro
set-iprint has no required arguments, the ACL2 evaluator was then
called on the form (set-iprint), that is, calling the macro on no
arguments. Set-iprint is defined to query the ACL2 user when its first
argument is omitted. The log shows that query, which is set up to read the
next form from the input stream. That form was available immediately: the
form t that had been supplied by the user. So the query returned
immediately and the set-iprint call was completed.
