Re: [Caml-list] ocaml killer

[Eric Stokes <eric.stokes@csun.edu>]

	Despite a little FUD (and bad English :P) I think this thread has a 
lot of good ideas in it. After reading it all it seems to me that Ocaml 
is in a transition period, more and more production oriented 
programmers are starting to pay serious attention to it. For my case, 
my organization has decided to migrate to Ocaml as our primary general 
purpose language. We have invested significant R&D into code written in 
Ocaml, and have recently launched our first production service written 
in it.
	That said, the concerns about libraries, and about a CPAN like 
repository are very good ones. There is a CPAN like repository for 
Ocaml (there are several), and while they are in a somewhat embryonic 
state, they are quite useable. The best example is the Ocaml link 
database http://www.npc.de/ocaml/linkdb/ almost all Ocaml libraries 
eventually get posted there. It is missing some features often 
associated with CPAN, however the most important feature of such a tool 
is that it serves as a directory of available libraries. The link 
database accomplishes this quite well, and serves the community well. 
GODI is looking to be a more complete CPAN clone for Ocaml, I have not 
played with it extensively yet, so I can't say too much more. Note 
also, that C and C++ have no central library repository, and yet they 
remain the industry standard general purpose languages. On the library 
side of things, there is a C interface, and a Perl interface, which 
opens up quite a lot of libraries to use from Ocaml. 	However, one of 
the main benefits of Ocaml is type safety, and using foreign language 
libraries throws away some of that type safety (the library is free to 
have grievous errors in it). The primary reason that my organization 
has switched to Ocaml is that we are under increasing pressure to write 
highly reliable software. From our point of view all of our libraries 
must eventually be rewritten in Ocaml, and the sooner the better. I 
don't think that the pressure we feel is without parallel elsewhere in 
the industry, so I think that Ocaml has quite a bright future as a 
production quality general purpose language.

On Jan 27, 2004, at 1:57 AM, Alexander Epifanov wrote:

> On 12:41 Tue 27 Jan     , Alexander Danilov wrote:
>> Alexander Epifanov wrote:
>>
>>> Hello,
>>>
>>> I have read message about Skala language, and I think (it's only my 
>>> IMHO),
>>> that ocaml have no future without some features, like concurrent
>>> programming
>>> (CP) and chance to use libraries from the other languages.
>>>
>>> 1) Erlang uses build in CP, but Skala has a library for it, IMHO it 
>>> would
>>> be a
>>> good way for ocaml feature. Thread module isn't enough for effective 
>>> usage
>>> of
>>> CP.
>>>
>>>
>>>
>> CP is not the main feature. For example, Perl has no good and stable 
>> CP
>> support, but it is very popular.
>> There are no so many task, that need CP.
> Maybe. but Thread isn't the best solution.
>>
>>> 2) No one would use ocaml without libraries, and it's so hard to 
>>> rewrite
>>> them
>>> all in ocaml. external functions aren't enough to use libraries from
>>> Languages
>>> like java or c++.
>>>
>>> Are any plans about these two features exists ?
>>>
>>> Thanks.
>>>
>>>
>>>
>> http://wiki.tcl.tk/critcl - here is interesting idea how to make
>> bindings wuickly. I think it can be implemented in Ocaml,
>>
>> The language will be preffered in many projects only when it have good
>> repository of packages, policy of packaging libraries, modules, etc.,
>> simple mechanism to install this packages over the net and so on. So I
>> think that for more popularity Ocaml need for something like CPAN
>> http://www.cpan.org/ . Thats why I don't use Tcl, Ruby, Ocaml in real
>> applications. If Ocaml community create packaging policy and network
>> archive, than number of Ocaml developers will increase much faster.
>>
> Yes, I can't use _only_ Ocaml for the projects.
>
>> Not CP, not multithreading can make programmer happy :), but CPAN can.
> nice phrase. I agree with you.
>>
>> P.S.: I know, my English is terrible, I will try to make it better :)
> My English more terrible, I'm just learning it :)
>
> -- 
> Gentoo Linux http://www.gentoo.org
>
> -------------------
> To unsubscribe, mail caml-list-request@inria.fr Archives: 
> http://caml.inria.fr
> Bug reports: http://caml.inria.fr/bin/caml-bugs FAQ: 
> http://caml.inria.fr/FAQ/
> Beginner's list: http://groups.yahoo.com/group/ocaml_beginners
>

-------------------
To unsubscribe, mail caml-list-request@inria.fr Archives: http://caml.inria.fr
Bug reports: http://caml.inria.fr/bin/caml-bugs FAQ: http://caml.inria.fr/FAQ/
Beginner's list: http://groups.yahoo.com/group/ocaml_beginners