We have a no-aliases convention in Crystal, so we can't have both ord and code_point.

@ysbaddaden Hm, I looked into source for Char and found for example:

  # Same as `to_i`.
  def to_i32(base : Int = 10) : Int32
    to_i(base)
  end

or other aliases, like (in iterable.cr):

  # Same as `each.cycle`.
  def cycle
    each.cycle
  end

Is this a new convention or...?

Those aren't aliases.

class Foo
  def name_foo
    # ...
  end

  def name_bar
    name_foo
  end
end

An alias serves no other purpose but to provide an alternate name for a single function.

The methods you show call different functions / wrap / shortcut to other behavior, not just "rename" a method.

See for example:

• Add alias_method macro to object #1966 (comment)
• alias_method - change argument order #1179 (comment)

We don't want aliases but it'd still be a valid proposal to rename ord to code_point. It's at least more descriptive.

On the other hand ord (and char) are traditional names for this conversion and established in many programming languages, including Crystal.

I think in some rare cases, aliases are useful - such example would be TempFile:
https://github.com/crystal-lang/crystal/blob/master/src/tempfile.cr#L110

  def unlink
    delete
  end

Here unlink is an alias to delete.

I believe that we should keep ord (it's used that way in Ruby, and it's often used in languages) and add the alias of code_point.

code_point is very verbose, therefore rendering mentioned comment:

more aliases mean more names to learn. Even if you don't use an alias, if somebody on your team or a project you are working on uses it, you'll have to learn it.

unapplicable here. I believe that when you want to get code point of char, the fact that it can be get using method code_point doesn't occupy any space in mind and doesn't give any mental overhead. On the other hand, if I use ord, I still know that it returns code_point. So I believe it's still worth adding (same as TempFile#delete and TempFile#unlink).

Tempfile#unlink is a lost alias. It should be removed because the proper naming is delete (e.g. there is File#delete but not File#unlink). There may be more lost aliases that should be removed.

If we keep Char#ord then we won't introduce Char#code_point. I have little opinion over which is better, thought I would recognize #ord but wouldn't be sure what #code_point actually is.

I understand - the crucial point of information here is that all existing aliases are legacy code.

I'm closing this PR, and I would be thrilled to help hunt these lost aliases down - will be making PRs if I found any (like #6036).