From mboxrd@z Thu Jan 1 00:00:00 1970 Received: (from majordomo@localhost) by pauillac.inria.fr (8.7.6/8.7.3) id CAA19793; Sat, 28 Aug 2004 02:25:30 +0200 (MET DST) X-Authentication-Warning: pauillac.inria.fr: majordomo set sender to owner-caml-list@pauillac.inria.fr using -f Received: from nez-perce.inria.fr (nez-perce.inria.fr [192.93.2.78]) by pauillac.inria.fr (8.7.6/8.7.3) with ESMTP id CAA18393 for ; Sat, 28 Aug 2004 02:25:29 +0200 (MET DST) Received: from smtp3.adl2.internode.on.net (smtp3.adl2.internode.on.net [203.16.214.203]) by nez-perce.inria.fr (8.13.0/8.13.0) with ESMTP id i7S0PRBK009147 for ; Sat, 28 Aug 2004 02:25:28 +0200 Received: from [192.168.1.200] (ppp212-216.lns2.syd3.internode.on.net [203.122.212.216]) by smtp3.adl2.internode.on.net (8.12.9/8.12.9) with ESMTP id i7S0PHHY058389; Sat, 28 Aug 2004 09:55:18 +0930 (CST) Subject: Re: [Caml-list] Alternative Bytecodes for OCaml From: skaller Reply-To: skaller@users.sourceforge.net To: John Goerzen Cc: caml-list , Nicolas Cannasse In-Reply-To: <200408271556.44476.jgoerzen@complete.org> References: <200408250926.28629.jgoerzen@complete.org> <200408271349.25317.jgoerzen@complete.org> <1093639193.15255.1543.camel@pelican.wigram> <200408271556.44476.jgoerzen@complete.org> Content-Type: text/plain Message-Id: <1093652716.15255.1636.camel@pelican.wigram> Mime-Version: 1.0 X-Mailer: Ximian Evolution 1.2.2 (1.2.2-4) Date: 28 Aug 2004 10:25:17 +1000 Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit X-Miltered: at nez-perce with ID 412FD0F7.001 by Joe's j-chkmail (http://j-chkmail.ensmp.fr)! X-Loop: caml-list@inria.fr X-Spam: no; 0.00; caml-list:01 bytecodes:01 sourceforge:01 2004:99 syscalls:01 interfacing:01 api:01 9660:01 glebe:01 ocaml:01 ocaml:01 garbage:01 jvm:01 approaches:01 interfaces:01 Sender: owner-caml-list@pauillac.inria.fr Precedence: bulk On Sat, 2004-08-28 at 06:56, John Goerzen wrote: > > Two reasons. One: C is the portable interface > > to almost all operating systems -- there are > > This means that you could write an OCaml interface to syscalls. > Granted, that's an advantage, but one I rarely need. Like when you read from a in_channel in Ocaml? You don't need to access the system. But the Ocaml team did, to give you that feature .. :) > > Two: there are a lot of libraries written > > in C with C interfaces, which are either > > compliant with some standard or open source. > > That's true. At the same time, binding to C is just about the most > difficult language I could imagine to bind to. Yeah? Just try interfacing two diffent memory management systems -- eg Ocaml and JVM garbage collectors :) [At least C doesn't really *have* any memory management system :] > I'm not disputing that at all. Obviously this is true. I'm just > suggesting that other approaches have utility, too, because they're > superior in some situations. And I'm not disputing that -- in general. I'm just questioning the utility of accessing inferior technology just to interface inferior libraries. My suggestion was the maximum utility would actually come from this when needing to access *custom* codes -- that is one off applications not worth rewriting, or, proprietary codes you cannot rewrite. > > Surely enhancing OcamlDBI is a viable option? > > I have to talk to several databases who provide drivers only for Windows > ODBC and Java JDBC. There is no hope of OCamlDBI supporting them, > ever. Hmm .. but Windows ODBC is just another C API for databases isn't it? So OcamlDBI can talk to it -- Ocaml does run on Windows :) -- John Skaller, mailto:skaller@users.sf.net voice: 061-2-9660-0850, snail: PO BOX 401 Glebe NSW 2037 Australia Checkout the Felix programming language http://felix.sf.net ------------------- To unsubscribe, mail caml-list-request@inria.fr Archives: http://caml.inria.fr Bug reports: http://caml.inria.fr/bin/caml-bugs FAQ: http://caml.inria.fr/FAQ/ Beginner's list: http://groups.yahoo.com/group/ocaml_beginners