From mboxrd@z Thu Jan 1 00:00:00 1970 Path: news.gmane.org!not-for-mail From: Neil Jerram Newsgroups: gmane.lisp.guile.devel Subject: Re: vm status update, a.k.a. yowsers batman it's february already Date: Tue, 03 Feb 2009 23:34:09 +0000 Message-ID: <87myd3hz7y.fsf@arudy.ossau.uklinux.net> References: NNTP-Posting-Host: lo.gmane.org Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii X-Trace: ger.gmane.org 1233704065 9954 80.91.229.12 (3 Feb 2009 23:34:25 GMT) X-Complaints-To: usenet@ger.gmane.org NNTP-Posting-Date: Tue, 3 Feb 2009 23:34:25 +0000 (UTC) Cc: guile-devel To: Andy Wingo Original-X-From: guile-devel-bounces+guile-devel=m.gmane.org@gnu.org Wed Feb 04 00:35:39 2009 Return-path: Envelope-to: guile-devel@m.gmane.org Original-Received: from lists.gnu.org ([199.232.76.165]) by lo.gmane.org with esmtp (Exim 4.50) id 1LUUnq-0001Ix-GA for guile-devel@m.gmane.org; Wed, 04 Feb 2009 00:35:38 +0100 Original-Received: from localhost ([127.0.0.1]:39736 helo=lists.gnu.org) by lists.gnu.org with esmtp (Exim 4.43) id 1LUUmX-0007PO-MW for guile-devel@m.gmane.org; Tue, 03 Feb 2009 18:34:17 -0500 Original-Received: from mailman by lists.gnu.org with tmda-scanned (Exim 4.43) id 1LUUmR-0007OC-RH for guile-devel@gnu.org; Tue, 03 Feb 2009 18:34:11 -0500 Original-Received: from exim by lists.gnu.org with spam-scanned (Exim 4.43) id 1LUUmR-0007Nu-5W for guile-devel@gnu.org; Tue, 03 Feb 2009 18:34:11 -0500 Original-Received: from [199.232.76.173] (port=50538 helo=monty-python.gnu.org) by lists.gnu.org with esmtp (Exim 4.43) id 1LUUmR-0007Nr-0i for guile-devel@gnu.org; Tue, 03 Feb 2009 18:34:11 -0500 Original-Received: from mail3.uklinux.net ([80.84.72.33]:54019) by monty-python.gnu.org with esmtp (Exim 4.60) (envelope-from ) id 1LUUmQ-0001g7-MG for guile-devel@gnu.org; Tue, 03 Feb 2009 18:34:10 -0500 Original-Received: from arudy (host86-157-180-39.range86-157.btcentralplus.com [86.157.180.39]) by mail3.uklinux.net (Postfix) with ESMTP id F34F81F6DEF; Tue, 3 Feb 2009 23:34:09 +0000 (GMT) Original-Received: from arudy.ossau.uklinux.net (arudy [127.0.0.1]) by arudy (Postfix) with ESMTP id 34FC638012; Tue, 3 Feb 2009 23:34:09 +0000 (GMT) In-Reply-To: (Andy Wingo's message of "Mon\, 02 Feb 2009 21\:28\:46 +0100") User-Agent: Gnus/5.11 (Gnus v5.11) Emacs/22.2 (gnu/linux) X-detected-operating-system: by monty-python.gnu.org: GNU/Linux 2.4-2.6 X-BeenThere: guile-devel@gnu.org X-Mailman-Version: 2.1.5 Precedence: list List-Id: "Developers list for Guile, the GNU extensibility library" List-Unsubscribe: , List-Archive: List-Post: List-Help: List-Subscribe: , Original-Sender: guile-devel-bounces+guile-devel=m.gmane.org@gnu.org Errors-To: guile-devel-bounces+guile-devel=m.gmane.org@gnu.org Xref: news.gmane.org gmane.lisp.guile.devel:8128 Archived-At: Andy Wingo writes: > * Just as we have a tower compilers (and thus languages), we now have a > tower of /decompilers/. Currently I've only implemented > value->objcode (only valid for values of type program or objcode), > objcode->bytecode, and bytecode->assembly, but it's possible to > implement passes decompiling all the way back to Scheme. > > Or JavaScript! That's the crazy thing: since multiple languages exist > on top of one substrate, decompilers allow us to do language > translation -- what Guile originally wanted to do, but as artifact > rather than as mechanism. That does sound interesting. But it sounds more like something educational to me, rather than a solution to the original translation desire. For example, it would allow us to show people the equivalent of a given Scheme program in their own preferred language - which would ultimately be helpful for teaching people Scheme. And by adding more sophisticated decompilation passes it might allow us to demonstrate how a given program can be written (through provable transformations) in several different ways, and consider which ways are conventionally considered to be more elegant. But is that the kind of thing that you had in mind, or have I missed your point? Regards, Neil