From mboxrd@z Thu Jan 1 00:00:00 1970 Return-Path: X-Spam-Checker-Version: SpamAssassin 3.1.3 (2006-06-01) on yquem.inria.fr X-Spam-Level: X-Spam-Status: No, score=0.3 required=5.0 tests=AWL autolearn=disabled version=3.1.3 X-Original-To: caml-list@yquem.inria.fr Delivered-To: caml-list@yquem.inria.fr Received: from mail2-relais-roc.national.inria.fr (mail2-relais-roc.national.inria.fr [192.134.164.83]) by yquem.inria.fr (Postfix) with ESMTP id 67CF8BC37 for ; Sat, 5 Sep 2009 12:52:31 +0200 (CEST) X-IronPort-Anti-Spam-Filtered: true X-IronPort-Anti-Spam-Result: AuoBAH3foUrUnwdkjWdsb2JhbACCIpkZAQEBAQkJCgkRBrxrgiQGgW0F X-IronPort-AV: E=Sophos;i="4.44,336,1249250400"; d="scan'208";a="32252395" Received: from relay.pcl-ipout02.plus.net ([212.159.7.100]) by mail2-smtp-roc.national.inria.fr with ESMTP/TLS/RC4-SHA; 05 Sep 2009 12:52:31 +0200 X-IronPort-Anti-Spam-Filtered: true X-IronPort-Anti-Spam-Result: AjoFAK/foUrUnw6U/2dsb2JhbACCItZDgiQGgW0F Received: from fhw-relay07.plus.net ([212.159.14.148]) by relay.pcl-ipout02.plus.net with ESMTP; 05 Sep 2009 11:52:30 +0100 Received: from [87.114.1.46] (helo=leper.local) by fhw-relay07.plus.net with esmtp (Exim) id 1Mjssg-0004TP-FZ for caml-list@yquem.inria.fr; Sat, 05 Sep 2009 11:52:30 +0100 From: Jon Harrop Organization: Flying Frog Consultancy Ltd. To: caml-list@yquem.inria.fr Subject: Re: [Caml-list] Why don't you use batteries? Date: Sat, 5 Sep 2009 13:03:28 +0100 User-Agent: KMail/1.9.9 References: <4A9FBF04.1060608@gmail.com> <001901ca2e0d$89f619a0$9de24ce0$@metastack.com> <20090905102230.GB4336@deb.happyleptic.org> In-Reply-To: <20090905102230.GB4336@deb.happyleptic.org> MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="iso-8859-1" Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit Content-Disposition: inline Message-Id: <200909051303.29059.jon@ffconsultancy.com> X-Plusnet-Relay: c1c7a3ae7b9002f533936d66e0c467ca X-Spam: no; 0.00; wikipedia:01 wiki:01 ocaml:01 ocaml:01 segfaults:01 distros:01 2009:98 presenta:98 frog:98 wrote:01 caml-list:01 binary:02 native:03 native:03 80%:96 On Saturday 05 September 2009 11:22:30 rixed@happyleptic.org wrote: > > Using a very simple analysis from > > http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Usage_share_of_desktop_operating_systems, > > 97.14%[1] of the computers in the world run an OS which does not have a > > "Linux"-style package manager (very sad, but true). > > With OCaml you can distribute native code programs, so the installation > problem is relevant only to programmers. Don't bank on it. We shipped a product called Presenta a few years ago that was written in OCaml and distributed as a native code executable for Linux. It was a complete disaster with 80% of users experiencing random segfaults and we canned the product and will never try to distribute compiled OCaml programs again. Linux is basically a complete disaster in this regard because it offers so little binary compatibility between distros. Building upon a decent VM solves this problem and many others, of course, but Linux has none. -- Dr Jon Harrop, Flying Frog Consultancy Ltd. http://www.ffconsultancy.com/?e