Re: [Emacs-diffs] master 35c893d 2/2: Move gensym to core Elisp

[Mark Oteiza]

On 12/09/17 at 12:48pm, Stefan Monnier wrote:
> > +(defun gensym (&optional prefix)
> > +  "Return a new uninterned symbol.
> > +The name is made by appending `gensym-counter' to PREFIX.
> > +PREFIX can be a string, and defaults to \"G\".
> > +If PREFIX is a number, it replaces the value of `gensym-counter'."
> 
> I understand that Common-Lisp has that "PREFIX is a number"
> functionality, but I could never find a use-case for it, so I wonder why
> we carry over that baggage to Elisp?

It was just simpler to not duplicate the code for such a small
historical tidbit.  I have no problem with the idea of dropping it.