Re: [Caml-list] OCaml IDEs for beginners?

["Benjamin C. Pierce" <bcpierce@saul.cis.upenn.edu>]

> About this subject, I would like to make a public Request for Features, in
> order to gather many opinions and tips about that IDE . ( which will be at
> the same time for beginners AND for experienced people ).

My own main request for a beginner IDE is that it be (or have a switch
that makes it) _absolutely_ as simple as possible.  It should provide a
few standard cursor movement and editing keybindings, standard
mouse-based selection, standard "Open" and "Save as" dialogs, a way of
taking the editing buffer and running it through OCaml, and ideally an
OCaml top level for direct interaction.  Maybe a documentation browser.
Nothing else.

At another level of ambition, an extremely useful feature would be the
ability to accept only a subset of OCaml -- e.g., requiring types of all
function parameters to be declared explicitly, providing only some simple
kinds of pattern matching, etc.  The DrScheme environment does a great
job with this.  

(Actually, the reason for wishing for language subsetting is not only to
prevent students from going outside of a small subset -- it also helps
prevent *professors* from accidentally generating examples that use more
of the language than they'd intended!)

     Benjamin

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