(def error-levels {:red 3 :orange 2 :yellow 1}) # Create a new prototype object called ErrorProto with one method, :compare (def ErrorProto @{:level nil # Returns -1, 0, 1 for x < y, x = y, x > y respectively. :compare (fn [self other] (let [lx (error-levels (self :level)) ly (error-levels (other :level))] (cond (< lx ly) -1 (> lx ly) 1 :else 0)))}) # Factory function to create new Error objects (defn make-error [level] (table/setproto @{:level level} ErrorProto)) (def err-red (make-error :red)) (def err-yell (make-error :yellow)) (def err-orange (make-error :orange)) # calls of the polymorphic compare function (compare err-red err-orange) # 1 (compare err-orange err-red) # -1 (compare err-red err-red) # 0 # These following functions call internally # the polymorphic compare function, but return a boolean value (compare> err-red err-orange) # true (compare> err-yell err-orange) # false (compare= err-yell err-yell) # true #------------------------------------------------------------------------------- # sort the objects with compare> and compare< (def errors-unsorted @[err-red err-yell err-orange]) # ascending order (sort errors-unsorted compare<) # => @[@{:level :yellow} @{:level :orange} @{:level :red}] # descending order (sort errors-unsorted compare>) # => @[@{:level :red} @{:level :orange} @{:level :yellow}] # without compare (sort-by |(error-levels ($ :level)) errors-unsorted) # => @[@{:level :yellow} @{:level :orange} @{:level :red}] # Note!!!, the following does not work as expected. # sort alone does not automatically use the compare function (the comparator) (sort errors-unsorted) # result is not sorted!