At 11:58 AM 8/1/00 -0500, Garrett Goebel wrote: >From: John Tobey [mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED]] > > > > Since this issue mainly affects Windows users (I assume), > >Actually I've run across a couple people wanting this on unices. I want it on VMS, too. > > That's a different problem. Configure is trying to reverse engineer > > header files. Garrett already knows the prototype of his DLL function > > he wants to call, but, unlike Configure, he doesn't have access to a C > > compiler. > >Well... I do have access to a C compiler, but not everyone does (nor should >have to). Creating an interface to a generic library without wrapper code would be a reasonably nifty thing. It'd take care of a good chunk of what Xs is used for. (We could reduce the average library interface module to a .PM file and a .DYNA_SPEC one, or something similar) >I guess I don't understand the pro's/con's of XS glue code vs. something >like FFI, Win32::API, or C::DynaLib. Can anyone elaborate on this? I'd like to see this info as well. I'm contemplating something similar for the embedding interface for perl, so maybe we can dovetail the two together or something. >I do know that writing XS stuff is pretty impossible for even your >intermediate Perl hackers. That is, unless they are at least intermediate C >coders as well. When it comes to working with XS files, I feel like I'm >trying to grapple a wet duck while bashing its 50 pound beak against a >problem. > >Whatever eventually replaces XS, I certainly hope that coding to it feels >more like Perl working with C, than mystic C macros working with Perl. It'll probably be more like C calling into a nice, well-behaved library with a well-defined interface that hands around a lot of magic cookies. If you want perl, well, use perl. :) Dan --------------------------------------"it's like this"------------------- Dan Sugalski even samurai [EMAIL PROTECTED] have teddy bears and even teddy bears get drunk
