New Issue: Random skipToNth, getNth - needed? good names?

19606, "vasslitvinov", "Random skipToNth, getNth - needed? good names?", "2022-04-05T20:11:33Z"

Background: today skipToNth(n) advances or rewinds the stream to the n-th position; getNth(n) combines that atomically with getting the next element.

Do we want to keep these methods?

getNth:

  • pro: provides an atomic combination

skipToNth and getNth:

  • con: we want to steer users away from using this often, as it is much slower than getNext()

If we keep these, what are good names for them?

skipToNth - rename to one of:

  • advance ? cons: it can also rewind
  • reposition ?
  • skipTo ?

getNth - rename to:

  • fetchAdvance - emphasizes atomicity; should it be 'advanceFetch' ?
  • skipFetch ?