Hello, On Mon, Nov 03, 2003 at 07:49:31PM +0100, Sven Luther wrote: > On Mon, Nov 03, 2003 at 10:43:28AM -0800, David Fox wrote: > > The least important reason is size. We are creating lots of small > > scripts, such as those you find in /etc/init.d, as part of our hardware > > detection/configuration system. When we byte-compile these scripts, > > they end up at about 400 to 500 k, which can add up. > > Mmm. > > > The more important reason is the ease with which people can modify these > > scripts, particularly when you are trying to fix a mis-configured > > system. For people who are not really interested in programming, but > > are just trying to get something to work, editing and running a script > > is quite a bit easier than finding and downloading the source (which > > maybe you can't do at all if your network isn't working) editing it, > > building it, installing it. Granted, for most people, editing a script > > is something they simply will not do. For a few others, building from > > source is just fine. But there are some people whose input is important > > to us who fall between these two categories. They have lots of energy > > and intelligence, but they come from a world of GUI's and don't have the > > Unix background we sometimes take for granted. If you point them to a > > script and tell them "try some different values here and here" they will > > go at it until it works. > > > > For myself, it is partly an aesthetic thing. Whenever practical, when > > efficiency is not an issue, I like to distribute software in the least > > obfuscated way, and put as few barriers as possible between the code and > > the (hapless?) reader. > > Ok, you sort of convinced me. I would like the opinion of the other > ocaml maintainers before i do that, in case there is something i may > miss that they do not. > > That said, i could make a ocaml-interpreter package, which would be > provided, replaced and conflicted by the ocaml package. What do you > think of that ? >
Even though i am not a DD, i just want to raise my hand and say that is a good idea ( i also develop some script in ocaml, and it should be a good idea to have a rather small package that give access to ocaml ). Kind regard Sylvain LE GALL
