[Caml-list] Re: How can I lend developers to the Caml team?

[Caml-list] Re: How can I lend developers to the Caml team?

[futureworlds]

> Some parts of the core OCaml distribution could
> use outside help ....  But the compilers and core
> runtime system don't need additional manpower,
> in my opinion.

> - Xavier Leroy


Xavier as a commercial guy I could not disagree more
strongly.  OCaml desperately needs more "core" developers.
A big problem I have selling OCaml to my company is that
only what, four people work on the core, and releases
are *very* slow.  There is CVS, but most programmers I
deal with don't want to mess with that, esp. on Windows.
They consider it too shaky and too bothersome.

Yes, OCaml also needs help in the external libs.
So what?  Don't turn down any help no matter where
it comes from or what it targets, provided it is well
qualified.  If they want to work on core, let them.
If someone offers you a free car, don't turn them down
because you wanted a free motorbike.

In fact it's very surprising that no third-party core
developers have joined to date, after all these years.
It's about time.  Look at how many folks work on Python
core for example.  All overseen by benevolent Guido.
And the Linux kernel has dozens, all overseen by Linus.
It works.

Aren't there bugs in the core that these guys could patch
and release to the public as prebuilds?  That would be a
nice start.  I hope you find a way to coordinate with them.

Jim

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RE: [Caml-list] Re: How can I lend developers to the Caml team?

[Brandon J. Van Every]

futureworlds wrote:
>
> > Some parts of the core OCaml distribution could
> > use outside help ....  But the compilers and core
> > runtime system don't need additional manpower,
> > in my opinion.
>
> > - Xavier Leroy
>
> Xavier as a commercial guy I could not disagree more
> strongly.  OCaml desperately needs more "core" developers.
> [...]
> If someone offers you a free car, don't turn them down
> because you wanted a free motorbike.

Aren't you forgetting that INRIA's goals aren't your goals?  I think it
would be best if we can figure out how to make "more commercial, more
pragmatic" contributions without invading INRIA's turf.  If we are more
considerate of what INRIA wants, if we can work with their concerns, we
might find them willing to declare "ok, let this be your area" on things
they aren't thinking too hard about right now.

> In fact it's very surprising that no third-party core
> developers have joined to date, after all these years.
> It's about time.  Look at how many folks work on Python
> core for example.  All overseen by benevolent Guido.
> And the Linux kernel has dozens, all overseen by Linus.
> It works.

Whereas my personal experience with Guido is he's damn inflexible when
he's made up his mind about something.  I don't have any experience with
him on the technology front, but for marketing, it was a debacle.  INRIA
is not Guido or Linus, it is not orchestration around a single
individual.  So consider yourself potentially thankful to be working
with an institution rather than a strong-willed individual.


Cheers,                         www.indiegamedesign.com
Brandon Van Every               Seattle, WA

20% of the world is real.
80% is gobbledygook we make up inside our own heads.

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RE: [Caml-list] Re: How can I lend developers to the Caml team?

[skaller]

On Sun, 2004-04-18 at 15:31, Brandon J. Van Every wrote:

> > If someone offers you a free car, don't turn them down
> > because you wanted a free motorbike.

What if your job is as a motorbike courier?

> Aren't you forgetting that INRIA's goals aren't your goals?  

Even so, I think we should take Xaviers claim as a face value
commercial assertion we should trust. More developers may slow 
down development of the facilities WE want. 

> > In fact it's very surprising that no third-party core
> > developers have joined to date, after all these years.
> > It's about time.  Look at how many folks work on Python
> > core for example. 

Python core design is largely stable. When it came
to upgrading it to Stackless Python the process fell
through. They got generators and a GC instead.

>  All overseen by benevolent Guido.

> Whereas my personal experience with Guido is he's damn inflexible when
> he's made up his mind about something.  I don't have any experience with
> him on the technology front,

I do. Lets say the half the major changes in Python were due to me,
and the only way I could bring about these changes was to
build a proof of principle interpreter, Vyper, in Ocaml.

Thankfully some of the other lead developers had enough
functional programming experience to understand the
advantages of something like lexical scoping and
closures .. 

Similar comments might be made about C++: Bjarne is somewhat
more savvy then Guido, but not enough to have put his
weight behind basic functional stuff for C++, which would
have been the only way to influence a technically ignorant
committee in time.

It's kind of nice to have lead developers who are both
top class theoreticians and expert technologists as well.
So in my opinion when Xavier says there are enough people
working on the Ocaml core, we should probably take that
at face value: we're all here because we *share* the 
INRIA teams basic goals.

-- 
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



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Re: [Caml-list] Re: How can I lend developers to the Caml team?

[Jeffrey J. Cook]

On Wed, Apr 21, 2004 at 06:16:43AM +1000, skaller wrote:
> On Tue, 2004-04-20 at 21:46, George Orwell wrote:
> 
> > Hey look, I think OCaml deserves a lot more prestige
> > and usage than it has.  These are just my own honest
> > opinions.  I am not trying to put people down.  It's
> > my sincere belief that more developers would help.
> 
> We all agree, including Xavier. However, the area
> most of us think requires more developers
> is the library and support tools, not the core
> compiler and runtime.
> 
> The area of the compiler needing most work
> industrially is package management, precisely
> to *allow* greater community contribution to the
> library.

I would also add a graphical debugger to that list; inspecting values of
complex recursive structures is a nightmare, not to meantion the annoyance
of abstract types, given only seperate 'printer' functions can be used.
Eipiere (folded into then back out of Cameleon) looked nice, but to my
knowledge is not active, nor up to date with 3.07 (or 3.06?).

-- 
Jeffrey J. Cook
Graduate Student, Electrical Engineering
University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign
jjcook@uiuc.edu

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Re: [Caml-list] Re: How can I lend developers to the Caml team?

[skaller]

On Tue, 2004-04-20 at 21:46, George Orwell wrote:

> Hey look, I think OCaml deserves a lot more prestige
> and usage than it has.  These are just my own honest
> opinions.  I am not trying to put people down.  It's
> my sincere belief that more developers would help.

We all agree, including Xavier. However, the area
most of us think requires more developers
is the library and support tools, not the core
compiler and runtime.

The area of the compiler needing most work
industrially is package management, precisely
to *allow* greater community contribution to the
library.


-- 
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



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Re: [Caml-list] Re: How can I lend developers to the Caml team?

[Shawn Wagner]

On Tue, Apr 20, 2004 at 06:41:27PM +0100, Benjamin Geer wrote:
> George Orwell wrote:
> >I base my opinion not on Xavier's capabilities but
> >on manpower.  The best man on the planet has limited
> >time and energy. 
> 
> To quote a truism of the Linux kernel developers, "Linus doesn't scale".[1]

An argument in favor of cloning? ;)

(Though the start-up time would be a killer)

-- 
Shawn Wagner
shawnw@speakeasy.org

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Re: [Caml-list] Re: How can I lend developers to the Caml team?

[Benjamin Geer]

George Orwell wrote:
> I base my opinion not on Xavier's capabilities but
> on manpower.  The best man on the planet has limited
> time and energy. 

To quote a truism of the Linux kernel developers, "Linus doesn't scale".[1]

Ben

[1] http://www.uwsg.iu.edu/hypermail/linux/kernel/9809.3/0957.html

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[Caml-list] Re: How can I lend developers to the Caml team?

[George Orwell]

> What if your job is as a motorbike courier?

Easy.  Let the guy with the car do those parts of your route
which are accessible by car.  You handle the intricate parts
on your bike.  Division of labor gets the job done faster.

> More developers may slow 
> down development of the facilities WE want. 

No.  There is plenty in the core that does not involve
fancy-dancy theoretical work.  With others working on the
mundane parts, like bug fixes, Xavier will be able to
focus on his expertise and research interests, which is
probably what he wants anyway.

What slows OCaml down is precisely that it is used
as a research vehicle.  Many languages like that exist.
They often don't make it out of the lab.  OCaml is in
a kind of purgatory right now.

> > > In fact it's very surprising that no third-party core
> > > developers have joined to date, after all these years.
> > > It's about time.  Look at how many folks work on Python
> > > core for example. 
> 
> Python core design is largely stable. When it came
> to upgrading it to Stackless Python the process fell
> through. They got generators and a GC instead.

Maybe the Python core is stable because of the number
of people working on it?  Ditto the Linux kernel?

My point was that Xavier should not fear he will
lose control by bringing people in.  As a top-notch
theorist he can make better design decisions than
Guido or Bjarne.  He can decide what parts of the
core others are competent to handle.  He can task
them as he sees fit.  If they want to do something
novel, he can screen it.

Targetting OCaml to Giotto/Ptolemy is an example
of the possibilities.  That is a purely back-end
change, not a language change, but it requires
core privileges.

> It's kind of nice to have lead developers who are both
> top class theoreticians and expert technologists as well.
> So in my opinion when Xavier says there are enough people
> working on the Ocaml core, we should probably take that
> at face value: we're all here because we *share* the 
> INRIA teams basic goals.

I base my opinion not on Xavier's capabilities but
on manpower.  The best man on the planet has limited
time and energy.  Giving lower-tier core tasks to
others enables us to get more out of Xavier, if you
like.

Hey look, I think OCaml deserves a lot more prestige
and usage than it has.  These are just my own honest
opinions.  I am not trying to put people down.  It's
my sincere belief that more developers would help.
It might be worth adding that those close to a project
are often the ones who most lack objectivity about it.
There is a sense of "my baby" involved.  Well, even
Mom eventually sends baby off to school for others
to help with the growth process.

Thank you-

Jim

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