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A simple compound term is composed of an atom of the first two forms (an alphanumeric or graphic atom), called the functor, immediately followed (no spaces) by a sequence of zero or more expressions separated by commas, enclosed in a pair of "("..")" parenthesis. For example:
data(jack, 35) tr(emp(),X/9,tr(L,7,R)) $$(5)
Simple compound terms are typically instances of a structured data type declared in the program where the functor is a constructor for the type. If not, the compound term has default type term
, and a warning that it is not a constructor of a defined type is issued in case there has been a spelling error.
A compound term is a simple compound term, or a compound term immediately followed by a sequence of zero or more expressions separated by commas, enclosed in a pair of "("..")" parenthesis. For example:
curry(*)(4) curryR(child_of)(mary)(P)
Compound terms that are not simple determine the functor of the compound term by a function call which is itself a compound term.