[Caml-list] Re: automatic extaction of the .mli (and a little more) from the .ml

[Hongbo Zhang <bobzhang1988@gmail.com>]

On 5/31/13 1:31 AM, Malcolm Matalka wrote:
> I know of no such tool, but in counter to your premise: I used to think
> maintaining a .ml and .mli was foolish, however I no longer do.  .mli is
> effectively documentation for me.  It contains a lot of comments and is
> generally written to reflect how the API should be used rather than the
> order in which I must express functions to get ta .ml to compile.  On
> top of that, ocamlc will fail to compile if your .ml and .mli don't
> match, so it's a valuable check that what I think my module does is also
> what the compiler does.  I also tend to write the .mli first, then write
> the .ml.  I find it to be a great way to develop.
>
> In short, I think it's a good thing to maintain these things by hand.
> But as for your original question I'm completely useless, sorry.
>
I had the same experience with you, after writing some large software in 
ML, I found it better to maintain mli by hand.
> /M
>
> Francois Berenger <berenger@riken.jp> writes:
>
>> Hello,
>>
>> Is there some recommended tool/script to generate a .mli
>> from the corresponding .ml?
>>
>> I want a little more than ocamlc -i:
>>
>> - I think there should be tags in the .ml file as comments
>>    that say "export this" to the .mli.
>>    By default, things are not exported.
>> - maybe it should have an option to say to replicate
>>    the ocamldoc comments in the .mli.
>> - it could be nice if the order in which things are exported
>>    to the .mli can be specified, maybe as an argument of the tag.
>>    So that the .mli can be more readable (only backward references
>>    to concepts, etc.)
>>
>> If there is a need to create a tool, let's call it "nomli". :)
>>
>> Regards,
>> F.
>>
>> PS: I'm not going to maintain both a .mli and a .ml.
>>      I feel it is a dumb and error-prone job and that
>>      itches me.
>