Re: Operator precedence

Kaz Kylheku <643-408-1753@kylheku.com> writes:

Furthermore exponentation between on an intermediate precedence level
between unary minus and regular minus is simply insane.

This is a very good argument! Prior to reading it I was kind of
indifferent (at least in infix programming languages, but not in typeset
mathematics).

I made it n-ary in TXR Lisp:
>
1> (expt 5 2)
25
2> (expt 5 2 3)
390625

... so conforming to the habit of typeset mathematics, which is based on
the fact that

    c
   b
  a

could be written as

   bc
  a

if meant to be left-associative. So having it right associative is the
more terse convention.

For further reading,

  https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Order_of_operations

is informative, while

  https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Graham%27s_number
  https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Knuth%27s_up-arrow_notation

are curiosities. Have fun!

Axel