This should actually be titled "Where are all the compilers?" ----- I haven't ranted in a couple of years, so I'm due. Ranting is nothing more than broadcasting my emotions from a soapbox but it is so fun, I love to do it.
Let me respectfully give my opinion. In no way am I criticizing your suggestion of here documents, nor am I ranting at the originator of the suggestion.
I feel that this feature is for higher level languages. I did not even want macros, but there was a lot of griping when I removed them, so I relented and Leo reversed the patch.
What really is the problem here is the lack of a decent alternative.
It is not PIR that is lacking features. PIR, by definition should lack features. It stands for "Pick-your-P-word Intermediate Representation." What is missing is a good implementation language that compiles to PIR. PIR is for compilers, not people, and I don't want to see PIR turn into "PIRL".
What I always wanted to do was implement a C subset for Parrot, and
write all "low-level" things in that language. C is very good for close
translation to underlying "hardware" and it doesn't take a full-time think-tank
to implement a compiler for it. I'd like to see thin drivers written for
things (ala JDBC Thin SQL drivers), with VERY limited use of native
interfaces. I actually have a pretty nice compiler sitting in my archives,
but got too busy with life to finish it. The little "Cola" language that is in languages
right now is a hack job that was a quick prototype to see if people would
actually write C like code for Parrot. Cola got very little interest, so I shelved
my work on it and IMCC2.
Years after I dumped much work into Parrot, I've seen no progress or support
from other language camps (Python, Scheme) and Perl 6 seems to be such a
daunting goal to implement, I'm afraid we won't a full, commercial-free implementation
for years. (I've written a couple of fully featured compilers in a matter of weeks, and I
won't even begin to tackle Perl6 unless someone offered to fund me full-time).
Heck, what happened to the Pony project? Is there anybody out there? Or did we
all find that we were happier with Perl 5 than we realized. Or were we so slow with Perl 6
that everyone had time to swallow the .NET pill?
I feel better now,
-Melvin
At 04:53 PM 2/24/2005, via RT wrote:
# New Ticket Created by Bernhard Schmalhofer # Please include the string: [perl #34258] # in the subject line of all future correspondence about this issue. # <URL: https://rt.perl.org/rt3/Ticket/Display.html?id=34258 >
Hi,
in the near, or far, future there will be test scripts and compiler input in PIR. For that it would be nice, if long text doesn't have to be crammed into a single line.
So some kind of HERE document syntax is needed for PIR. Suggestions for syntax elements are welcome. '<<' is already taken for the left shift operator.
CU, Bernhard
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