[ocaml-infra] Fwd: [Caml-list] Working Group: the future of syntax extensions in OCaml, after camlp4

[Ashish Agarwal]

On Thu, Jan 24, 2013 at 9:56 AM, Anil Madhavapeddy <anil at recoil.org> wrote:

first of several working groups ... wg-parallel (multicore/distributed
> programming)


This is great! I'm personally interested in the wg-parallel one.


Firstly, is there agreement on this approach, and secondly, what's the best
> way to reflect this on ocaml.org?
>

Do you mean to publicize the groups? We've had some discussion [1] about a
User Groups page, which could be generalized to groups of all sorts,
perhaps split into different sections. Working groups could all be listed
here with a description and links to their mailing lists, etc. Actually,
this resolves the problem we were having that currently there are not
enough groups to justify a whole separate page.

[1] https://github.com/ocaml/ocaml.org/issues/97

-Ashish



Begin forwarded message:
>
> > From: Alain Frisch <alain at frisch.fr>
> > Subject: [Caml-list] Working Group: the future of syntax extensions in
> OCaml, after camlp4
> > Date: 24 January 2013 14:31:01 GMT
> > To: caml-list <caml-list at inria.fr>
> > Cc: wg-camlp4 at lists.ocaml.org, Leo P White <lpw25 at cam.ac.uk>, Anil
> Madhavapeddy <avsm2 at cl.cam.ac.uk>
> >
> > Dear caml-list,
> >
> > There is a growing opinion that camlp4 is overly complex considering the
> benefits it brings to OCaml developers.  I would personally go as far as to
> say that the future of OCaml and the OCaml community would be brighter if
> camlp4 could be removed from our "basic ecosystem".  In particular, most of
> the current uses of camlp4 to create syntax extensions could probably be
> replaced by the new "-ppx" technology (see below) and small extensions to
> the compilers.
> >
> > A lot needs to happens for this camlp4-free OCaml ecosystem to become a
> reality and we have to come up with a solid transition plan.  A new
> community-driven working group, chaired by Leo White and me, is being set
> up today to elaborate this plan.  If this topic is of interest to you,
> please join our mailing list:
> >
> >  http://lists.ocaml.org/listinfo/wg-camlp4
> >
> >
> > Some of the most important tasks for our new working group will be:
> >
> > - Gather information from the community about the use of camlp4.
> >   (Please consider sharing information about your use of camlp4
> >   and camlp4-based extensions, even if you don't plan to participate
> >   to the working group discussions!)
> >
> > - Finalize support for -ppx and make technical proposals for
> >   extensions of the OCaml compilers in order to enable a transition of
> >   camlp4-based extensions to -ppx (in particular, we need to come up
> >   with a concrete syntax for generic extension points in the grammar).
> >
> > - Write some "canonical" examples of extensions based on -ppx and
> >   provide information and support to developers of extensions for
> >   switching from camlp4 to -ppx.
> >
> > - Discuss integration of -ppx with existing tools (findlib, build
> >   systems, etc).
> >
> > - Find a solution in the community for the future of camlp4
> >   (in particular, discuss how / how long / by who it will be
> >   maintained).
> >
> > - Discuss longer-terms plans beyond -ppx, including extra language
> >   support, to facilitate light syntactic meta-programming for OCaml
> >   (Leo has some clever ideas!).
> >
> >
> >
> > The discussion on the mailing list will start in a few days, to give
> some time for interested people to join.  In the meanwhile, Leo has written
> a blog post to get the discussion started:
> >
> > http://www.lpw25.net/2013/01/23/camlp4-alternative-part-1.html
> >
> > You can also read about -ppx:
> >
> > http://www.lexifi.com/blog/syntax-extensions-without-camlp4
> > http://www.lexifi.com/blog/syntax-extensions-without-camlp4-lets-do-it
> >
> > Some projects have already started to replace camlp4 by -ppx:
> >
> >  bisect (supports both camlp4 and ppx since version 1.3)
> >  sedlex (unicode-friendly lexer generator, successor of ulex)
> >  omonad (syntax for monadic code, similar to pa_monad)
> >
> >
> > Many thanks to Anil Madhavapeddy and to OCamlLabs for setting up the
> working group and its mailing list!
> >
> >
> > Alain
> >
> > --
> > Caml-list mailing list.  Subscription management and archives:
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> >
>
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