On Thursday, March 21, 2002, at 10:10 AM, Xavier Leroy wrote:
>
> [...] You're confusing whole programs with libraries.  [...] Only 
> developers (= users of third-party libraries) have to deal with code 
> compatibility issues.

I'm a practitioner and not a researcher, so I share many of Mr. 
Henrikson's concerns, but I think I see your point.

Most of my concerns revolve around the problems I expect to face in 
bundling an application that comprises many little programs that share 
one or more large libraries.  I'd like to see better support for dynamic 
loading, á la Scaml, but I can see that a policy of "source-only 
distribution" for libraries between developers is a completely different 
matter.

While the "source-only distribution" policy doesn't put a clamp on my 
personal plans, I do think that this decision will have to be revisited 
before Ocaml will make a successful transition from academia into 
industry.

One of the main attractions for industry to the C and Java languages are 
their crude-yet-functional support for "closed-source distribution" of 
libraries.  Without trying to make a political statement, I would 
suggest that Ocaml could make a *much* bigger dent in the side of the 
world, if the Caml team were to reconsider the concerns of industry in 
this matter.

I've already posted my opinion about application packaging systems, but 
it's not a religious issue for me, so I'll just let it go.


--
j h woodyatt <jhw@wetware.com>

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