>>>>> "Matthew" == Matthew Dempsky <xxxxxx@flame.org> writes:

Matthew> Michael Sperber <xxxxxx@informatik.uni-tuebingen.de> writes:

>> - Many (but not all) Scheme systems can quite easily support it,
>>   because it already matches the FFI they have currently.

>> - There's lots of experience with this kind of FFI, and it's proven
>>   to work (for Scheme systems supporting it) for hooking up a wide
>>   variety of C libraries.

Matthew> Both of these points rest on the issue of "Scheme systems that support
Matthew> it" and I have an uneasy feeling about that.  I would be more
Matthew> comfortable with a C FFI SRFI that could be supported by any Scheme
Matthew> system.

Sure, we all would be.  You deleted the part of my post that referred
to that.  The point is that many Scheme systems *already* support a
SRFI-50-style FFI.

Matthew> That doesn't help implementations that can _only_ provide a Pika-style
Matthew> or JNI-style FFI, however.  Instead code will be written to support
Matthew> the present FFI and will need to be rewritten before they can be of
Matthew> any use to other implementations that couldn't provide this FFI.

Again, I referred to lots of code that *already* is written for a
SRFI-50-style FFI, and that would need to be rewritten anyway for a
JNI- or Pika-style FFI.

Matthew> I'm mildly confused by this last statement -- are the intentions still
Matthew> to finalize SRFI-50 without resolving the issues brought up on the
Matthew> mailing list [...]

I'm mildly confused by your statement.  We haven't formulated our
intention yet.  However, as Richard has explained, it is so far not
our intention to change SRFI 50 into a Pika- or JNI-style FFI.

Matthew> It's my understanding that any existing final SRFI _could_ be
Matthew> implemented by every Scheme implementation with primarily minor
Matthew> changes -- most can even be implemented entirely in Scheme.

That's understanding is mistaken.  A short look reveals at least:

SRFI 0
SRFI 4
SRFI 6
SRFI 10
SRFI 14
SRFI 17
SRFI 18
SRFI 21
SRFI 22
SRFI 30

to have the same property.  A more strict interpretation would yield
more.

--
Cheers =8-} Mike
Friede, Völkerverständigung und überhaupt blabla