[Haskell-cafe] Re: statep haskell-lang [was: Re: Hoogle and Network.Socket]

[Jonathan Cast]

On Fri, 2009-02-27 at 00:04 +0100, Achim Schneider wrote:
> Jonathan Cast <jonathanccast at fastmail.fm> wrote:
> > (I am actually writing my own language;
> > when I get something usable for real work, I may very well just plain
> > un-subscribe from haskell-cafe, even though I will continue using
> > Haskell for bootstrapping for some time after that.)

I've actually got a complete syntax (except the module system (which,
for me, means mostly type classes :)), a type checker (which has lambda
terms --- including higher-order ones --- but no local declarations
yet), and an implementation that seems like it would mostly do what I
want if the standard library were rich enough to write interesting
things in.

Actual documentation is more lacking: I'm partway through a syntax man
page (including I think the most interesting parts of the language);
unfortunately, it's written in Global Script, and uses both features of
the language I haven't implemented yet and a library I haven't even
started.

> /me is curious.

I'm not sure what the best interface for publishing this is.  Blogs seem
to be somewhat standard; I should probably revive mine.

> And I'm wondering whether you're aware of the stuff Luke is working on
> (http://lukepalmer.wordpress.com/).

I've read all those posts through Planet Haskell; I don't think they've
made it into my list of interesting things to consider w.r.t. language
design yet.

> Personally, I've got some thoughts
> about a syntax, a preliminary parser and a lot of half-understood ideas.

Hmm.  Today's the first day I've really given serious consideration to
the viability of replacing Haskell with Global Script, even in
principle.  After all, trying to replace one of the most successful
research languages in existence would be hubristic.  (And as SPJ has
said, it won't happen by someone setting out to do it explicitly).  To
avoid hubris (which my study of Greek tragedy tells me is the greatest
danger to heroes), I've been busy convincing myself I'm really trying to
replace TeX, instead.  After all, TeX is clearly a much less adequate
programming language...

jcc