Re: Why not zlib-compress-region?

[Stefan Monnier <monnier@iro.umontreal.ca>]

> Again, building GCC is not something an end user would easily consider
> when all she needs is to be able to use some plugin.

Indeed.   Luckily, there's no such need: the end user only needs to
*install* a compiler.  Also, for Windows we could consider binary
distributions, like we do for the emacs binary itself.

In any case, the fac that the dl-loaded library needs to include
a special "gpl-compatible" tag means that in 99% of the cases, it
wouldn't be one of the pre-existing libraries already installed on the
system.  So one way or another we'll end up having to tell people to
install a C compiler, or we'll have to distribute pre-compiled binaries.

Furthermore, a "plain FFI" like what I suggest (with bindings written in
C) is very useful even if we also have a "modern FFI" (with bindings
written in some DSL).  Rather than argue whether it's useful or not,
I wish someone could get the ball rolling (and if she wants to do it
with a "modern FFI", then it's fine by me as well, I'm only advocating
the "plain FFI" because it's much less work, so it seems like a much
more realistic goal, and some of its work would be useful for
a subsequent "modern FFI" anyway).


        Stefan