Re: [Haskell-cafe] WANTED: Compensated Haskell Hacker for Language Project

2011-03-29 Thread Bryan Edds
Hi Jake!

 My only question is this: what does your language offer that others do 
 not with respect to soft real time systems? The language you describe in 
 the linked forum thread looks neat, but I think I'm missing the 
 reasoning behind its design. Why is this design beneficial for soft real 
 time compared to other high level languages?

The main thrust of the design is to provide nearly the power of Lisp and ML's
semantics in a form that is syntactically palatable to the mass of intelligent
industry programmers. While industry programmers typically prefer C-style
languages, it's just not possible to build a C-style language with a reasonable
macro development (language orientation) experience due to C's inherent
syntactic complexities. Further, it seems to have been historically demonstrated
that C-family programmers are not willing to make the a syntactic leap as far as
say, Lisp or Ocaml.

Barring the provision of yet another C-style language, there's another set of
languages many C-family programmers do rather like: Ruby and Python. So by
finding a direct mapping from s-expressions to a language with an feel and
visual appeal similar to Python that ALSO approaches the machine efficiency of
C++, I hope to create a lisp- and ML-derived language that is accessible to an
audience wider than existing functional languages seem to have reached.

As you can see, the design does admit some semantic compromises in the name of
syntax and efficiency, but the compromise is surprisingly (at least to me)
minimal. One compromise made in the name of C++ efficiency is the use of a
machine word-sized default number type rather than the default number type used
in lisp or Haskell. Of course, arbitrary number types can be made available
naturally via a library using simple binary operation overrides, but they are
not the default when you type the literal 5.

I've discovered, at least to my own current satisfaction, that bringing lisp-
and ML-style semantics to the masses is possible with less semantic compromises
than previously seemed possible. By providing a language that industry
programmers feel comfortable with, I hope to move as many of them as possible
into the functional / language-oriented world.

But more than that, I'm just designing the language I wish I could use everyday
instead of C++ and C# :)


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Re: [Haskell-cafe] WANTED: Compensated Haskell Hacker for Language Project

2011-03-29 Thread Vo Minh Thu
2011/3/29 Bryan Edds bryane...@yahoo.com:
 Hi Jake!

 My only question is this: what does your language offer that others do
 not with respect to soft real time systems? The language you describe in
 the linked forum thread looks neat, but I think I'm missing the
 reasoning behind its design. Why is this design beneficial for soft real
 time compared to other high level languages?

 The main thrust of the design is to provide nearly the power of Lisp and ML's
 semantics in a form that is syntactically palatable to the mass of intelligent
 industry programmers. While industry programmers typically prefer C-style
 languages, it's just not possible to build a C-style language with a 
 reasonable
 macro development (language orientation) experience due to C's inherent
 syntactic complexities. Further, it seems to have been historically 
 demonstrated
 that C-family programmers are not willing to make the a syntactic leap as far 
 as
 say, Lisp or Ocaml.

 Barring the provision of yet another C-style language, there's another set of
 languages many C-family programmers do rather like: Ruby and Python. So by
 finding a direct mapping from s-expressions to a language with an feel and
 visual appeal similar to Python that ALSO approaches the machine efficiency of
 C++, I hope to create a lisp- and ML-derived language that is accessible to an
 audience wider than existing functional languages seem to have reached.

 As you can see, the design does admit some semantic compromises in the name of
 syntax and efficiency, but the compromise is surprisingly (at least to me)
 minimal. One compromise made in the name of C++ efficiency is the use of a
 machine word-sized default number type rather than the default number type 
 used
 in lisp or Haskell. Of course, arbitrary number types can be made available
 naturally via a library using simple binary operation overrides, but they are
 not the default when you type the literal 5.

 I've discovered, at least to my own current satisfaction, that bringing lisp-
 and ML-style semantics to the masses is possible with less semantic 
 compromises
 than previously seemed possible. By providing a language that industry
 programmers feel comfortable with, I hope to move as many of them as possible
 into the functional / language-oriented world.

 But more than that, I'm just designing the language I wish I could use 
 everyday
 instead of C++ and C# :)

Hi,

First of all, I wish you good luck in your project.

Your mail made me think of my little syntactical[0] library. It needs
some love but is in principle very flexible. It makes a clear mapping
between distfix expressions and s-expressions. Distfix expressions are
flexible enough to accomodate for a lot of the usual constructs one
can find in programming languages.

Maybe you'll find it useful.

Cheers,
Thu

[0] http://hackage.haskell.org/package/syntactical

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[Haskell-cafe] WANTED: Compensated Haskell Hacker for Language Project

2011-03-27 Thread Bryan Edds
Hello fellow Haskellers!

I have a language I would like to prototype in Haskell. It's a 
'language-oriented' programming language based on Lisp, ML, and Python. It's a 
relatively small language, but should be powerful enough to have many of its 
features implemented in terms of itself (classes, actors, almost all syntax, 
etc.)

While the project is compensated, I'm just a commercial game programmer by day 
and don't have a corporate budget, so part of the motivation is the joy of the 
project itself. Otherwise, I have a budget of $4k - $6k USD over the next 
several months to compensate someone to hack it up for me. I don't have much in 
the way of specs, and the design is ongoing (almost certainly some holes), but 
there is an overview of the design here - 
http://channel9.msdn.com/Forums/Coffeehouse/Prototyping-New-Language-With-Haskell

I really want to churn it out as a nice working concept to prove the language 
design and language oriented programming is practical even for soft-real time 
software like console games. The project will be open source throughout its 
development and the language will be free to use. I really want it to take off, 
despite my meager resources :)

Beyond that, I'm looking for charitable investors once the prototype is 
finished and proven. I want to find other people are so sick of writing 
soft-real time software in C-family languages at their work place that it's 
worth the donation. Perhaps there is some company who might be interested in 
further incubating the project if it proves commercially interesting :)

I do ask for the code to be reasonably clean as I would like to be able to help 
once I get some time. I would be implementing the thing fully myself, but I am 
way too swamped at work :) Since I have to rest my hands during my off hours, I 
would like to do most communication by voice. Feel free to record any of the 
communication if you like.

If anyone is interested and has the credentials to bring the project to 
fruition, please contact me at bryane...@yahoo.com straight away.

Thanks!

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Re: [Haskell-cafe] WANTED: Compensated Haskell Hacker for Language Project

2011-03-27 Thread Jake McArthur
I share your dream of being able to write high-level code for soft real 
time software, so while I'm not interested in working on your project 
directly at this time, it's still in my best interest for it to be 
successful.


My only question is this: what does your language offer that others do 
not with respect to soft real time systems? The language you describe in 
the linked forum thread looks neat, but I think I'm missing the 
reasoning behind its design. Why is this design beneficial for soft real 
time compared to other high level languages?


- Jake

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