Attribute list format

[Daniel L. Weinreb <dlw@SCRC-TENEX>]

    Date: Tuesday, 19 April 1983, 05:09-EST
    From: Barry Margolin <Margolin at MIT-Multics>
    In ZWEI in Release 4.0, System 222.186, Zmail 74.43,
    Experimental Macsyma 6.15, site configuration 12, on Zarniwoop:

    It would be nice if the Update Attribute List and Set Backspace commands
    could agree on the "proper" way to specify a binary mode's value in the
    attribute list.  Update Attribute List likes to say "Backspace: T" while
    Set Backspace likes to say "Backspace: Yes".  I realize that both will
    work, but that is for the benefit of those humans who prefer to edit the
    attribute list line themselves; the automatic mechanisms should pick
    something they like and stick with it.  If it matters, I prefer the
    Yes/No version.

There isn't any Yes/No version.  No isn't NIL, so it means the same
thing as Yes.  Yeah, I know, this is stupid.  Either attribute lists
should be changed such that No will mean NIL, or the editor commands
should stop using "Yes".  The former has the following problem: it means
that there would have to be a database of which property names are of
the Yes/No variety (you wouldn't want to convert "Mode: No", for
example), and so if you created your own keywords, their definition
would have to be loaded before any files using those keywords were seen.
That might be acceptable.  However, the latter solution is probably
easier.