[NTG-pdftex] \pdfprimitive

[Hans Hagen]

Heiko Oberdiek wrote:
> On Sat, Apr 07, 2007 at 07:53:52PM +0200, Hans Hagen wrote:
>
>   
>> ??? wrote:
>>     
>>> 2007/4/6, Philip & Le Khanh <Philip-and-LeKhanh at royal-tunbridge-wells.org>:
>>>   
>>>       
>>>> rather than just PDF primitives ...  If
>>>> this is the case, is there any chance of
>>>> a better choice of name in a future release ?
>>>>     
>>>>         
>>> Would you prefer a pdfTeX version that suddenly has a primitive \foo
>>> thus potentially breaking all documents already providing \foo ? :-)
>>>       
>> if a document provides \foo, then a nw primitive \foo is never seen
>> because the document obscures it; actually, the user won't even notice;
>>     
>
> If the document uses \newcommand, then the user will get an error.
> If the user uses a package that uses the new foo, this package
> will probably break.
> ...
>   

\let\mynamespacedprimitive=\primitive
\let\primitive\undefined
>   
>> only when a macro package uses \foo there could be a problem but that's
>> seldom the user's concern
>>     
>
> Some will generate bug reports that could have been avoided in the
> first place.
>   
\pdfsomething can be in use as well, you never knw what users have defined 

when etex came around \protected and \unexpanded were examples of a command that had a great potential for clashes (context had both already defined but i just use saved meanings then); such is live, such is progress 

Hans 


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