[eclipse-clp-users] Dealing with ambiguity between empty arrays and empty lists

Lists are defined in ECLiPSe as recursive data structures with root term
'[]' so that an empty list is represented by the atom '[]'. Arrays are
simply compound terms with functor '[]', thus empty arrays are also
represented by the atom '[]'.

This ambiguity leads to inconsistencies in instances where empty arrays
must be distinguished from empty lists. As an example, consider the
following query that uses dim/2 to both create a two-dimensional array
and retrieve the dimensions of that array:

?- dim(Array2D, [3, 0]), dim(Array2D, Dims).

Array2D = []([], [], [])
Dims = [3]

In this example, the dimensions provided to dim/2 in the first call do
not match the dimensions that it derives from the array in the second call.

Two approaches to dealing with this problem come to mind:
1) Avoid the use of empty arrays.
2) Represent arrays using a different functor, and rewrite all
predicates that handle arrays to accommodate.

Neither of these approaches is ideal. Are there any alternatives that
I'm missing?

Thanks,
Alex