[xquery-talk] XQuery needs to prohibit variable redefinition

[Per Bothner]

Michael Kay wrote:

> The comment has been made privately and publicly, very forcibly, and has
> been rejected on each occasion. The only way I can try to summarise the
> rationale is "no needless restrictions" - the language is well-defined if
> variable redefinition is allowed, therefore it shouldn't be disallowed.

That's the dumbest rationale for a language feature yet!  The language
is also well-defined if variable redefinition are *not* allowed.

If we have a feature without a use-case, where removing it may reduce
a *very* common case of beginner confusion (as we've seen too many
times on this list), and a significant source of hard-to-find (beginner
and non-beginner) bugs, then it seems like a non-brainer to me.

(I'm guessing from your reply that you don't disagree.)
-- 
	--Per Bothner
per at bothner.com   http://per.bothner.com/