thread_default vs prolog_flag

[tswift]

All:

I've been going through the standardization proposal to implement more
of the multi-threading options for XSB. By and large I'm in agreement
with the May 2007 version, but I do have some reservations about
thread_set_default.

I agree that its important to be able to have changeable default
settings -- but it seems like setting aside a group of Prolog flags
for this purpose would work just as well, and in my opinion be more
elegant. I think its nice for users to know that they can alter any
default setting in a system by one or another Prolog flag -- this
makes it easier to find out information when you are new to a system.
Indeed, this is the approach we have taken in XSB for a number of
settable table defaults.

Does anyone have a good argument for using thread_default and
thread_set_default over prolog_flag and set_prolog_flag?

Terry

[Paulo Moura]