On 15 April 2014 03:54, Martin Baker <[email protected]> wrote: > ... > I think, where we differ, is the approach. You want to maximise backward > compatibility and therefore do lots of small incremental steps. I would like > to find an approach that allows me to do what I want a lot faster even if > this means cutting out old stuff. I really like the idea of very small, lean > and high level codebase. > > I don't think we are ever going to agree on this and its possible that what > I am trying to do is totally impractical. Therefore it would probably save a > lot of arguing if I just experiment with the interpreter independently for a > while and leave it upto you when you do a new release. >
Martin, I doubt that Waldek wants backwards compatibility just for its own sake. I do not see much arguing going on here, in fact it looks very cooperative to me. But what you are advocating does seem both impractical and naive. Computer programming and computer algebra system development in particular is an "inhuman" activity - something that most people can do only at the limits of their abilities. if we want to progress we need to work within these limitations. And another thing that is limited in open source development is project structure and co-operation between individuals. Open source development is for the most part anarchistic, most of the time everybody does their own thing. Incremental development is one of the most important strategies for dealing with both these limitations. On the other hand experimentation is at the heart of open source development. It is the ability to experiment and the resulting diversity of approaches that provides something new. So I think it is great that you are willing to do this and share it with others. Cheers, Bill Page. -- You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups "FriCAS - computer algebra system" group. To unsubscribe from this group and stop receiving emails from it, send an email to [email protected]. To post to this group, send email to [email protected]. Visit this group at http://groups.google.com/group/fricas-devel. For more options, visit https://groups.google.com/d/optout.
