Not that I want to be a party-pooper, but you seem to be describing a cool but textual version of what Simulink does for Matlab. Actually, if you look at the .m files that Simulink generates, they look like Matlab code which is not that different from the Felix code you showed.
HOWEVER, Simulink does embody a 'new paradigm' for certain domain-specific languages -- which works well for circuits as well as any control system. And there are a lot of control systems out there. And coding them is a real pain -- if you can draw a picture and all the rest can be done for you, that would indeed be great. Note that Simulink has a sort-of type system too - you can't just connect any wire to any plug. Of course, here Felix could really shine. Though wire+connectors view of software architecture is > 20 years old (at least in the theory world...). Fiadeiro's "Category Theory for Software Engineering" has a nice chapter on that. Anyways, the main thing is: make sure programming with circuits in Felix is more compelling that doing the same in Simulink. Borrow their good ideas. Fix their stupid ideas (like the 12 o'clock rule). And remember one thing that we learned the hard way (on a doomed project at a company I used to work for): do NOT try to find a circuits analogy to classical imperative programming -- it's a fool's errand. We wasted a lot of time on that, before realizing that classical imperative programming is best done in classical imperative languages. Solving higher-level problems which did not embody a natural "control strategy" was on the other hand well-suited to circuits kind of thinking. Jacques ------------------------------------------------------------------------- This SF.net email is sponsored by DB2 Express Download DB2 Express C - the FREE version of DB2 express and take control of your XML. No limits. Just data. Click to get it now. http://sourceforge.net/powerbar/db2/ _______________________________________________ Felix-language mailing list Felix-language@lists.sourceforge.net https://lists.sourceforge.net/lists/listinfo/felix-language
