non-inclusive intervals in ADL

I was dusting off the old parser and running it over the sample
test files on the openehr subversion site

dev/adl/test

My parser didn't handle the new 1.4 non-inclusive
intervals, or the new duration stuff - fair enough, so I
have updated it to pass the test archetypes. However, I
have now realise that the location of the > character
in the test archetypes is actually different than the
location in the ADL specs (in some spots).

4.5.2 has the explanation of ranges and does it with
the > after the number.. and 5.4.2.2 has an example of

length matches {|0>..<1000|}

where the test files have this as

length matches {|>0..<1000|}

i.e. the > character comes immediately after the | character.

Also, can we drop the 'infinity'/'*' open ended range thing
from intervals - I don't think anyone uses them, they seem to
add nothing to the expressiveness of the ADL, and it just seems
like a waste to even have them in the grammar (|>=5| seems
to be as clear to me as |5..infinity|)

Andrew

Andrew,

I have created a new PR with you as the reporter - feel free to clean up
the explanation / add details - see
http://www.openehr.org/issues/browse/SPEC-286

- thomas

Andrew Patterson wrote:

Hi all,

I think (IMHO) the notation 5..* is very clear, you know what you're
talking about at a glance, I vote to have both notation options to
open intervals in ADL.

Cheers,
Pablo Pazos Gutierrez

I think (IMHO) the notation 5..* is very clear, you know what you're
talking about at a glance, I vote to have both notation options to
open intervals in ADL.

But is 5..infinity necessary as well? That makes 3 ways of saying
the same thing..

=5|

5..*|
5..infinity|

It's not a big deal, but it just adds needless complexity to parsers
and the spec.. I'd vote for the infinity keyword to be dropped and
just have the *, or >= form..

Andrew

I think (IMHO) the notation 5..* is very clear, you know what you're
talking about at a glance, I vote to have both notation options to
open intervals in ADL.

But is 5..infinity necessary as well? That makes 3 ways of saying
the same thing..

You're right, the use of infinity is not so clear at a glance, it mix
symbols ('5','..') with words.
I think 5..* is the clearest way of the three below (I'm used to this
notation).

And don't forget that "infinity" is just an English word. There are
people out there that simply won't know what it means.