did it again .. somebody smack me upside the head!
---------- Forwarded message ---------- From: Drew Crampsie drew.crampsie@gmail.com Date: 2009/9/1 Subject: Re: [cltl3-devel] RFC: CLtL3 Charter To: Gustavo gugamilare@gmail.com
2009/9/1 Gustavo gugamilare@gmail.com:
2009/9/1 drew.crampsie@gmail.com
I'd personally much prefer a 'lispy' (read : verbose and understandable) implementation of regexps then the one from perl, and still wouldn't want it included as part of CLtL3..
cl-ppcre allow the use of sexps as regexps. I think that they are "verbose" and "understandable".
So it might ... but as per section 4 "Preference will be given to topics that cannot be implemented portably and have multiple existing implementations.".
There will be a library folks, and that is what you as a coder will likely use. CLtL3 is not for coders, but for implementors and library authors (who, yes, are also coders but you get the idea). It's for things we can't currently do in portable common lisp, not for things that have been done and already see wide use. There is nothing holding back the acceptance of cl-ppcre as the 'standard' portable implementation of perl compatible regular expressions, so why waste time documenting and discussing it?
It will take an incredible amount of effort to describe in any detail the interface of cl-ppcre, and for little to no gain. When a new perl comes out, do we go ahead and change the standard? do we freeze cl-ppcre at the time we publish CLtL3?
I understand that what a lot of people want is a 'standard library', and not an updated description. I'd like that too. But we have to get there somehow, and as it stands we cannot build our 'standard library' on Standard Common Lisp. That is what CLtL3 is trying to fix.
Cheers,
drewc
On Wed, Sep 2, 2009 at 2:40 AM, Drew Crampsiedrew.crampsie@gmail.com wrote:
I understand that what a lot of people want is a 'standard library', and not an updated description. I'd like that too. But we have to get there somehow, and as it stands we cannot build our 'standard library' on Standard Common Lisp. That is what CLtL3 is trying to fix.
Point 2 is perhaps a bit confusing on this matter. Is building such a library part of the CLtL3 effort? If not, point 2 doesn't make that very clear.
2009/9/1 Luís Oliveira luismbo@gmail.com:
On Wed, Sep 2, 2009 at 2:40 AM, Drew Crampsiedrew.crampsie@gmail.com wrote:
I understand that what a lot of people want is a 'standard library', and not an updated description. I'd like that too. But we have to get there somehow, and as it stands we cannot build our 'standard library' on Standard Common Lisp. That is what CLtL3 is trying to fix.
Point 2 is perhaps a bit confusing on this matter. Is building such a library part of the CLtL3 effort? If not, point 2 doesn't make that very clear.
Getting to the point where we can build such a library is the purpose of the CLtL3 effort. That library (or libraries.. competition is good) will come later, once it's possible to build it :). It may indeed be the same people who work on cltl3 that make (or gather) the library, and i'd like to document the library as a part of CLtL3 (one stop shopping!), but we need to get there first.
My personal goals involve building such a library, but i want to limit the scope of the (initial) CLtL3 effort to something that can actually be achieved, and be useful, with minimal effort on the parts of all involved.
At one point the idea of three levels was mentioned : base, extensions, and library. Our initial focus should be on the base language, and be kept as small and simple as possible. If, in parallel, library authors wish to write code to CLtL3 rather than ANSI + extensions, that's a big plus.
So, point 2 might need a little re-wording if the intent is not clear.
Cheers,
drewc
-- Luís Oliveira http://student.dei.uc.pt/~lmoliv/
On 1-Sep-09, at 6:40 PM, Drew Crampsie wrote:
did it again .. somebody smack me upside the head!
---------- Forwarded message ---------- From: Drew Crampsie drew.crampsie@gmail.com Date: 2009/9/1 Subject: Re: [cltl3-devel] RFC: CLtL3 Charter To: Gustavo gugamilare@gmail.com
2009/9/1 Gustavo gugamilare@gmail.com:
2009/9/1 drew.crampsie@gmail.com
I'd personally much prefer a 'lispy' (read : verbose and understandable) implementation of regexps then the one from perl, and still wouldn't want it included as part of CLtL3..
cl-ppcre allow the use of sexps as regexps. I think that they are "verbose" and "understandable".
So it might ... but as per section 4 "Preference will be given to topics that cannot be implemented portably and have multiple existing implementations.".
Well, as far as these kinds of lisp<->os interactions go, splitting things up into packages or modules has worked out pretty well for python and (I think) ruby. It seems natural not to clutter the cl-user namespace with a lot of symbols that aren't needed universally, and it is just as easy to (require 'cl-net) || (require 'cl-os) || (require 'cl-sys), for networking, system interfaces, and path operations respectively, especially if their presence in a 'standard' library was pretty much guaranteed. There's also the fact that making updates to these subsystems within the context of a library is much easier than updating the core system, particularly if cltl3 ends up with a large deployment base of legacy applications.
Kind Regards.,
Brian O'Reilly
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Brian O'Reilly -
Drew Crampsie -
Luís Oliveira