2008/4/23 Waldek Hebisch wrote: > ... > For FriCAS in longer run dropping Lisp is likely -- most Lisp code > is machine generated during FriCAS build. With enough effort we > could directly generate C code. Currently effort to drop Lisp would > be prohibitive, but the FriCAS code is constanly cleaned up and > simplified so in the future such change will be much easier. >
I have a question that might at first seem heretical, but I think that the answer might possibly be of some interest to the Sage developers... Both you and Gaby have discussed the possibility of defining an abstract machine (aka. run-time system) to replace the role that Lisp plays for Axiom. We also know that Aldor has already defined such a machine called FOAM. FOAM can be implemented either in Lisp (for interface with Axiom) or by a run-time system written entirely in C for stand alone use. In fact this strategy is quite common and we here a lot for example about the Java Virtual Machine. Now it turns out that Python also has this notion of an abstract virtual machine that is the target for the Python interpreter. There are already some languages other than Python that can produce low level code for the Python virtual machine. I believe that the current Python virtual machine would very likely be adequate to support the run time requirements of Axiom/Aldor. So my question is: Is there be any possibility and interest in producing either an Axiom/Spad or Aldor compiler that targets this same virtual machine? In principle (and I admit that this is a big leap) this would allow complete interoperability between Sage and Axiom or Aldor. Perhaps you have other ideas about how to achieve this kind of interoperability? I could imagine for example linking Python directly into the Aldor C run-time system or maybe linking the Python into the lisp image that runs Axiom? What do you think? Is this crazy? Regards, Bill Page. --~--~---------~--~----~------------~-------~--~----~ To post to this group, send email to sage-devel@googlegroups.com To unsubscribe from this group, send email to [EMAIL PROTECTED] For more options, visit this group at http://groups.google.com/group/sage-devel URLs: http://www.sagemath.org -~----------~----~----~----~------~----~------~--~---
