distfix

programming ("distributed fixity"?) A description of an

operator represented by multiple symbols before, between,

and/or after the arguments.

The classical example is the C conditional operator, "?:"

which is written

E1 ? E2 : E3

If E1 is true it returns E2 otherwise it returns E3. Several

functional programming languages, e.g. Hope, Haskell,

have similar operators ("if E1 then E2 else E3").

Objective C messages are effectively distfix operator

applications:

getRow:row andColumn:col ofCell:cell

is a message with three arguments, row, col, and cell.

(1997-01-21)