I don't think that it's going to matter how *fast* the Thrift compiler is - it's going to be a trivial amount of time one way or another.
However, I do feel strongly that we should use a language with a compiler to write our compiler, simply because I don't think there's any way that we're going to avoid having a bajillion lines of code, and all things considered, I'd rather have a bajillion lines of Java than Python, if for no other reason that for the refactoring tools. I don't want to get mired in quibbling about our favorite language. If someone has a really clear alternative that would be orders of magnitude more productive due to magical templating or something, then speak up. Otherwise, I think we should take the path of least resistance and port to Java - it's accessible, more capable, and C-like enough that we'll be able to copy/paste/fix rather than starting over from scratch. On Thu, Aug 26, 2010 at 4:28 PM, Greg Stein <[email protected]> wrote: > On Thu, Aug 26, 2010 at 19:17, Todd Lipcon <[email protected]> wrote: > > On Thu, Aug 26, 2010 at 4:12 PM, David Reiss <[email protected]> > wrote: > > > >> Roger, you misunderstood that patch. It just lets you run configure and > >> make > >> to build the code generator and java/python/etc. libraries without > having > >> to > >> build the C++ runtime library. > >> > >> Also, I think I have a patch lying around to make the code generator not > >> rely > >> on boost. > >> > >> > > Not relying on boost would be a great start! That's probably the biggest > > obstacle - autoconf, etc, is annoying but boost is just the worst. > > Agreed. I *loathe* Boost. > > When I first went to build Thrift, I downloaded Boost and > built/installed it. I didn't know the magic incantations to limit the > thing, but figured "how bad can it be?" > > Well, I learned as soon as it said something about dealing 6000 header > files. Seriously. My include/boost-1_37/boost directory contains 6639 > header files. That's just fucked. > > Regarding switch to Java? Meh. I've never found Java-based command > line tools to be all that useful or performant. They always seem to > have very bizarre idiosyncrasies. > > That said, I have most of a Python-based Thrift compiler sitting around. > :-P > > Cheers, > -g >
