Re: [Caml-list] Unix.file_descr -> int ???

["Jean-Marc Eber" <jeanmarc.eber@lexifi.com>]

Dear Ocaml friends,

> > The most important debate is: should Ocaml give access to all Unix
> > ugliness (and dirty tricks)? I think that for pragmatic reasons the
> > answer should definitely be yes.
>
> "Pragmatisme, que de crimes commis en ton nom"...

Oh Yes !!! :-)

A library that gives access to all Unix tricks would clearly have its place
on the ocaml cdk, or the hump maybe, but...

>
> > Ocaml targets not only academia but also the real world
> > (otherwise, the Ocaml consortium has no sense).

Yes indeed. And as an "industrial user" (+consortium member), I can
only confirm that it does it well (or, more precisely, very well if one
looks
at the restricted resources available at inria on the ocaml project).

We should definitively distinguish clearly between what is _possible_ with
Ocaml (more or less anything, if you agree to use a little bit yourself the
C interface) and what should be included in the _standard_ libraries
(and, by the way, what must then be supported along all versions by the
ocaml team: that's the point) and is therefore provided as "good" ocaml
"practice".

I want to emphasize again here that we, as industrials, are using ocaml not
because of any hacking capacity, but because of the intrinsic quality of
the
language and its implementation _plus_ the _insurance_ that we could, if
necessary, do "dirty" tricks by ourselves (because of source code access).

Clearly, there _are_ "dirty tricks" we, as industrials, are interested in
and
cannot do ourselves, and where we depend on the ocaml team.

An example ?

Targeting the .NET platform with ocaml, as F# seems to show the technical
possibility (or look, at least, for some easy way to interface with this
platform).

No please, please,... no flameware.... :-)

To be clear: I think that the "industrial" users need isn't an endless
extension
of the standard libraries (they cover today many, many needs, I think), but
an easy
integration with the "rest of us" (ole automation, Java, .NET,...).
For us (or, more preciselly, our potential customers), thats really the
_only_
"bottleneck" with ocaml.

>
> I can assure you that in an "industrial" programming setting,
> guaranteeing (some amount of) Unix-Windows source-code portability is
> a *lot* more important than the marginal Unix hacks you describe.
>

Yes. And I insist: a *lot* !

Thanks to the ocaml team for making our industrial "programming experience"
(*)
easier and funny !

Jean-Marc Eber
LexiFi

(*) that's a typical industrial buzzword... which may or may not be
registered by some
company(ies).



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