[MLton] Windows port of MLton using the Microsoft tools(e.g.without MinGW)

[skaller]

On Thu, 2007-07-26 at 19:03 +0200, Nicolas Bertolotti wrote:
> Well, my goal is not to discuss whether Microsoft or GPL is free or not.

Nor mine, but you raised it as an objection to using MS compiler.

> My goal is not either to discuss whether MLton has been well written or not,
> or whether it is portable or not.

But surely if it is possible to make the code more portable
that is important for porting .. :)

> I'm wondering whether it possible to develop a native port of MLton for
> Windows because it is something that might be useful (at least for me) and I
> want to discuss about it.

I agree! It would be useful to me too.

> I don't need any information about "Felix". 

Then don't say things like not knowing that there
are any other portable compilers than 'Java' or someone
is bound to correct your mistake.

> I don't know what it is and as
> far as I know, it has nothing to do with the issue I'm facing. 

You're wrong. It has a lot to do with it. I'm the developer
not only of Felix itself, but also much of the build system.

I spend 6 months full time, and around a year total, working
with several other developers to get my product building
on multiple platforms.

I am therefore contributing what I know about how to do
that, since I'd like to see Mlton also build on multiple platforms.

My basic line is: Mlton developers should think seriously
about getting rid of all Unix tools, especially make
and bash, because these two are major obstacles to
portable building.

Perl or Python are more portable and vastly superior,
however this DOES require rewriting a lot of scripts,
so it isn't a short term project.

> I also don't want anyone to tell me that it is impossible or stupid to work
> on this subject as it certainly isn't.

I agree, it isn't stupid! 

My point originally was in conversation with Wesley because we
don't agree on 'the way forward'. But we do agree on the objective
of obtaining working Windows version of Mlton (including Win64
on x64=x86_64 processor).

Our dispute basically whether gcc is the way to go,
or whether MSVC is the way to go. I personally think
going with MSVC is the right approach ..and that is supportive
of your work.

-- 
John Skaller <skaller at users dot sf dot net>
Felix, successor to C++: http://felix.sf.net