Reverse Compose

Reverse Compose (⍛), also known as Before, is a primitive operator closely related to Beside (∘), also known as After. Called dyadically with function operands f and g, it uses f monadically to pre-processes the left argument before applying g between the pre-processed left argument and the given right argument. X f⍛g Y is thus equivalent to (f X) g Y. The operator can be defined as the dop {(⍺⍺ ⍺) ⍵⍵ ⍵}.

Reverse compose was introduced in Extended Dyalog APL, and then adopted into dzaima/APL. Its dyadic case matches I's Hook (h), which is a reflected form of a J Hook, while Backhook (H) matches the ordinary Hook or Compose: because I's precedence order is left to right, it considers the "reversed" APL form to be primary. The monadic case was discussed for a while in the APL Orchard. To be completely consistent with the other function composition, the left "leg" would be removed, making f⍛g Y be equivalent to g Y. However, this would never apply f and would questionably be called a composition of f and g. Instead, it was concluded that the best solution would be to have f⍛g Y be a hook, f⍛g⍨Y, that is, f⍛g $\Leftrightarrow$ f⍛g⍨⍨.

Common usage

Its plain usage is to pre-process left arguments without needing one or more applications of Commute (⍨). For example, the square of the left argument minus the right argument can be expressed as:

Try it online!

      3×⍨⍛-2
7

Works in: dzaima/APL, Extended Dyalog APL

It can also be combined with Beside to create the split-compose construct. Here, we take the sign of the left argument and apply it to (that is, multiply it with) the absolute value of the right argument:

Try it online!

      3 ¯1 4×⍛×∘|¯2 ¯7 1
2 ¯7 1

Works in: dzaima/APL, Extended Dyalog APL

APL built-ins [edit]
Primitives (Timeline)	Functions
Scalar
		Monadic	Conjugate ∙ Negate ∙ Signum ∙ Reciprocal ∙ Magnitude ∙ Exponential ∙ Natural Logarithm ∙ Floor ∙ Ceiling ∙ Factorial ∙ Not ∙ Pi Times ∙ Roll ∙ Type ∙ Imaginary ∙ Square Root ∙ Round
		Dyadic	Add ∙ Subtract ∙ Times ∙ Divide ∙ Residue ∙ Power ∙ Logarithm ∙ Minimum ∙ Maximum ∙ Binomial ∙ Comparison functions ∙ Boolean functions (And, Or, Nand, Nor) ∙ GCD ∙ LCM ∙ Circular ∙ Complex ∙ Root
Non-Scalar
		Structural	Shape ∙ Reshape ∙ Tally ∙ Depth ∙ Ravel ∙ Enlist ∙ Table ∙ Catenate ∙ Reverse ∙ Rotate ∙ Transpose ∙ Raze ∙ Mix ∙ Split ∙ Enclose ∙ Nest ∙ Cut (K) ∙ Pair ∙ Link ∙ Partitioned Enclose ∙ Partition
		Selection	First ∙ Pick ∙ Take ∙ Drop ∙ Unique ∙ Identity ∙ Stop ∙ Select ∙ Replicate ∙ Expand ∙ Set functions (Intersection ∙ Union ∙ Without) ∙ Bracket indexing ∙ Index ∙ Cartesian Product ∙ Sort
		Selector	Index generator ∙ Grade ∙ Index Of ∙ Interval Index ∙ Indices ∙ Deal ∙ Prefix and suffix vectors
		Computational	Match ∙ Not Match ∙ Membership ∙ Find ∙ Nub Sieve ∙ Encode ∙ Decode ∙ Matrix Inverse ∙ Matrix Divide ∙ Format ∙ Execute ∙ Materialise ∙ Range
Operators	Monadic	Each ∙ Commute ∙ Constant ∙ Replicate ∙ Expand ∙ Reduce ∙ Windowed Reduce ∙ Scan ∙ Outer Product ∙ Key ∙ I-Beam ∙ Spawn ∙ Function axis ∙ Identity (Null, Ident)
Operators	Dyadic	Bind ∙ Compositions (Compose, Reverse Compose, Beside, Withe, Atop, Over) ∙ Inner Product ∙ Determinant ∙ Power ∙ At ∙ Under ∙ Rank ∙ Depth ∙ Variant ∙ Stencil ∙ Cut ∙ Direct definition (operator) ∙ Identity (Lev, Dex)
Quad names	Index origin ∙ Comparison tolerance ∙ Migration level ∙ Atomic vector

Reverse Compose

Common usage

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