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Dart language spec update to 0.08

Posted by Seth Ladd

The Dart team has updated the Dart language spec to version 0.08. Changes include:

5:  Static variables are lazily initialized, but need not be constants. Orthogonal notion of constant variable introduced.
7.1.2: Added equals operator as part of revised == treatment.
7.5.1: Initializing formals have the same type as the field they correspond to.
7.7: Static variable getter rules revised to deal with lazy initialization.
10: Modified syntax to support cascaded method invocations.
10.1: Removed support for + operator on Strings. Extended string constants to support certain cases of string interpolation. Revised constants to deal with constant variables
10.5: Corrected definition of HEX_DIGIT_SEQUENCE. Support implicit concatenation of adjacent single line strings.
10.13.2: Centralized and corrected type rules for function invocation.
10.14: Moved rules for checking function/method invocations to 10.1.3.2. Added definition of cascaded method invocations.
10.1510.16: Updated noSuchMethod() call for getters and setters to conform to planned API.
10.17: Modified syntax to support cascaded method invocations.
10:20: Revised semantics for ==.
10:28: Removed importlibrary and source from list of built-in identifiers. Revised rules for evaluating identifiers to deal with lazy static variable initialization.
11.13: Fixed bug that allowed continue labeled on non-loops.
12: Revised syntax so no space is permitted between # and directives. Introduced show: combinator. Describe prefix: as a combinator. Added initial discussion of namespaces. Preclude string interpolation in arguments to directives.

Not everything is implemented by both the Dart VM and the Dart to JavaScript compiler yet.

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