Unlike Jim Self, I've never had occasion to review the source code of GT.M but I do not doubt that it is very well written. Compiling a dynamic language like MUMPS does, of course, does pose special challenges due to its dynamic nature. If I can invoke a routine indirectly (by name) at run-time what are my options? Two obvious alternatives that suggest themselves are compiling to an intermediate representation (like Parrot from the Perl 6 project) or to rely on some combination of thunking and just in time compilation. Nevertheless, it should be possible to compile and run existing code. XECUTE statements, of course, are used to executed MUMPS source that is specified at run-time and so isn't really amenable to the same shortcuts as indirection.
That being said, it is not obvious to me that there is any technical reason that existing compiled code could not be linked with VistA components written in a newer version of the language, and hence the requirement to not break existing code does not imply that the language has to be frozen in time. Thus, it seems to me that the backward compatibility argument is really a red herring, and the truth is that there is little interest in developing a new version of the language. That's fine, of course, but *I* am not particularly interested in porting MUMPS to new platforms if there is little interest in updating the language. === Gregory Woodhouse <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> "Design quality doesn't ensure success, but design failure can ensure failure." --Kent Beck ------------------------------------------------------- SF.Net email is Sponsored by the Better Software Conference & EXPO September 19-22, 2005 * San Francisco, CA * Development Lifecycle Practices Agile & Plan-Driven Development * Managing Projects & Teams * Testing & QA Security * Process Improvement & Measurement * http://www.sqe.com/bsce5sf _______________________________________________ Hardhats-members mailing list Hardhats-members@lists.sourceforge.net https://lists.sourceforge.net/lists/listinfo/hardhats-members
