[Richard Suchenwirth] 2005-12-12 - In the [Tcl chatroom], [CMcC] said:

 You know, in retrospect, I think [set x a b c] should be equivalent to [set x [list a b c]]

Well, [Tcl] is where [wish]es come true :) Here's my experimental code that overloads [set], and seems to work fine, as far as I've tested. I had to reuse the _var name for [upvar], so the error message comes right if the variable doesn't exist yet:

 rename set _set
 proc set {_var args} {
    upvar 1 $_var $_var
    _set ll [llength [info level 0]]
    if {$ll==3} {
        _set $_var [lindex $args 0]
    } elseif {$ll>3} {_set $_var $args}
    _set $_var
 }
''[Lars H]: Ehh... Why this insanely complicated solution? The user-supplied name for a local variable is just asking for trouble -- consider what happens for [[set ll]]!! The straightforward solution is rather:''
 proc set {varname args} {
    upvar 1 $varname var
    if {[llength $args] == 0} then {
       return $var
    } elseif {[llength $args] == 1} then {
       _set var [lindex $args 0]
    } else {
       _set var $args
    }
 }
''[RS]: It is to avoid the misleading error message''
 % set foo
 can't read "var": no such variable

The distinction between $ll==3 and $ll>3 is necessary so this frequent case comes right:
 set something {}
Testing:
 % source myset.tcl
 % set foo
 can't read "foo": no such variable
 % set foo 1
 1
 % set foo
 1
 % set bar 2 3 4
 2 3 4
 % set bar
 2 3 4
 % set grill {{}}
 {}
 % set grill
 {}
 % set nix {}
 % set nix
 %

So far it looks as expected. But bytecode compilation may lose performance if a fundamental like [set] is pulled from under its feet...

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