From mboxrd@z Thu Jan 1 00:00:00 1970 Received: (from majordomo@localhost) by pauillac.inria.fr (8.7.6/8.7.3) id JAA25051; Wed, 28 Mar 2001 09:50:04 +0200 (MET DST) X-Authentication-Warning: pauillac.inria.fr: majordomo set sender to owner-caml-list@pauillac.inria.fr using -f Received: (from weis@localhost) by pauillac.inria.fr (8.7.6/8.7.3) id JAA25046 for caml-list@pauillac.inria.fr; Wed, 28 Mar 2001 09:50:03 +0200 (MET DST) Received: from concorde.inria.fr (concorde.inria.fr [192.93.2.39]) by pauillac.inria.fr (8.7.6/8.7.3) with ESMTP id BAA17924 for ; Wed, 28 Mar 2001 01:44:12 +0200 (MET DST) Received: from localhost.localdomain (ppp8.dyn142.pacific.net.au [210.23.142.8]) by concorde.inria.fr (8.11.1/8.10.0) with ESMTP id f2RNi8n14648 for ; Wed, 28 Mar 2001 01:44:09 +0200 (MET DST) Received: from ozemail.com.au (IDENT:root@localhost [127.0.0.1]) by localhost.localdomain (8.9.3/8.8.7) with ESMTP id JAA23845; Wed, 28 Mar 2001 09:43:02 +1000 Message-ID: <3AC12586.E96D150E@ozemail.com.au> Date: Wed, 28 Mar 2001 09:43:02 +1000 From: John Max Skaller X-Mailer: Mozilla 4.7 [en] (X11; I; Linux 2.2.12-20 i686) X-Accept-Language: en MIME-Version: 1.0 To: Brian Rogoff CC: Vijay Chakravarthy , mattias.waldau@abc.se, Arturo Borquez , caml-list@inria.fr Subject: Re: [Caml-list] Why People Aren't Using OCAML? (was Haskell) References: Content-Type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit Sender: owner-caml-list@pauillac.inria.fr Precedence: bulk Brian Rogoff wrote: > > The main difficulties we have faced have been -- > > a) Education - Out here even for people skilled in scheme and some other > > functional languages, it is challenging to learn ocaml. > > What have the issues been? I hate to mention this again (and again, ...) but > I find that beginners and non-experts stumble over syntax a lot. The main problem is that the Tutorial and Reference are weak. If the Ocaml Consortium gets off the ground, this ought to be one of it's first tasks (i.e., hire a tech writer, not a programmer!) I am constantly stumbling over syntax: even when the underlying principles are clear, it is hard to find the right syntax, and it is even harder to comprehend which constructions are actually supported by the compiler. My main source of information is postings to this list. > I would have said that it's ideal for VLSI design software (any other EDA > hackers out there?) so maybe it's just ideal for everything? No. It isn't so good for low level systems software, (use C or C++) nor for integration tasks (use C). It should be much better than Java for everything Java can do, if only library support were extended, with some core support for security and internet. -- John (Max) Skaller, mailto:skaller@maxtal.com.au 10/1 Toxteth Rd Glebe NSW 2037 Australia voice: 61-2-9660-0850 checkout Vyper http://Vyper.sourceforge.net download Interscript http://Interscript.sourceforge.net ------------------- To unsubscribe, mail caml-list-request@inria.fr. Archives: http://caml.inria.fr