Richard Coleman <coleman@math.gatech.edu> writes:
> Part of the problem is that scheme developers have been developing
> their own scheme implementations rather than rallying around a
> single distribution. This divides the energy of the group and
> results in a dozen (slightly incompatible) scheme implementations.
This statement is rather wrong. There are multiple implementations
simply because there are different sets of requirements that a Scheme
implementation may be written to satisfy. Tcl is pretty useless for
writing a real code - even a small loop takes ages to
interpret. Scheme, on the other hand, can run as fast as C when
compiled. So, you have compiled implementations (Bigloo, Stalin,
Hobbit, Rscheme). Then you may go for the classical macro language,
and SIOD is great here. It's just small enough to be cheap to embed.
> So if you want scsh, you use scheme48. If you want Tk, you
> use STk. If you want database access you use SIOD. Etc...
None of these (except SIOD) are meant to be extension languages. They
are meant to serve as standalon Schemes.
> Hopefully when Guile arrives on the scene, many of these things
> will be eventually available for it (primarily due to the higher
> profile of the FSF and GNU project).
Yes, Guile looks great - or will, when modules start popping
up. Currently, though, it's still rapidly changing.
> Also I think the scheme community has been tackling the wrong
> problem. They want to replace C/C++/Java, when they should be
> trying to replace Perl/Tcl/Python.
Scheme has several purposes. I don't see why free software developers
should satisfy themselves by serving only one.
Miro
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