On 2/16/07, skaller <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote: > What are the key features of Felix? Why are you interested?
To me, this question reads "what does Felix do that O'Caml doesn't do?" (O'Caml being my current favorite language). From this perspective, what's gotten me interested in Felix is the following: * Performance at least as good as O'Caml Whether Felix is faster than C makes little difference to me (though I know this is important to many potential users). However I would see little point in using it if its performance were not at least on par with a compiled language such as O'Caml: there are many other languages whose features overlap those of Felix but whose performance suffers because of it (Haskell, Erlang, etc.) * Transparent C FFI I LOVE that Felix's datatypes are fully abstract and can represent any C datatype under the sun. Being able to access existing C libraries with little extra work (thanks to flxcc) opens up a world of possibilities not readily available in other languages. I've longed for a language with a C FFI such as Felix's. The only languages I know of that even come close are Pyrex (Python's C extension language) and C-like languages such as Cyclone and D. * An eye toward verification Felix is the first general-purpose language I know of aiming to directly support code verification. While some languages such as Nice support ensures / requires annotations (and about every language supports assert), Felix supports more (e.g. axiom and reduce) and they are intended for the support of automated code verification utilities. (I haven't had a chance to check it out yet but the recent addition of support for Why is exactly what I'm looking for!) * Typeclasses I'm addicted to O'Caml's solid module system, and typeclasses are even better. * Easy-to-use syntax extension I often work with DSLs. camlp4 is great, but it's a bear to learn. Felix's macro system looks very promising, though I haven't yet had a chance to play with it. I think Felix's built-in syntaxes for lexers and parsers is a great example of this system. If Felix did not have these things (especially the first two) then I would see little reason to switch to it from O'Caml (since many of their other features overlap). What makes Felix attractive to me is that, besides being a decent general-purpose multiparadigm language (which many languages can claim), it goes above and beyond to support features found only in niche academic languages (e.g. verification and typeclasses) and low-level imperative languages (e.g. good performance and transparent FFI) without compromising its overall design. - Chris ------------------------------------------------------------------------- Take Surveys. Earn Cash. Influence the Future of IT Join SourceForge.net's Techsay panel and you'll get the chance to share your opinions on IT & business topics through brief surveys-and earn cash http://www.techsay.com/default.php?page=join.php&p=sourceforge&CID=DEVDEV _______________________________________________ Felix-language mailing list [email protected] https://lists.sourceforge.net/lists/listinfo/felix-language
