[MLton-user] Unicode support, port from Moscow ML

[Alexandre]

On Dec 28, 2004, at 10:53, Stephen Weeks wrote:

>> does there is any information available about planned time, when
>> unicode (utf-8) will be supported?
>
> Unicode will be supported in the next public release, which I would
> guess will take place in summer 2005.  We have begun work on adding
> support, and hope there will be an experimental version in our CVS in
> a month or two.  You can also check
>
> 	http://mlton.org/Unicode
>
> where we will add more information as the support is added.

Yes, I know that page, but there is no release plans there...
Sorry, that's maybe stupid question, but why it will be so long? Not 
enough time or SML definition just know nothing about that?
Does I understand right, that now I even could not store unicode 
(utf-8) char/string?

>> And anther one question: is it difficult to port some modules (ODBC,
>> PostgreSQL, dbm) from Moscow ML? Does there is some docs about that?
>
> Most of the port should be easy.  One challenge will come because the
> implementation of these modules relies on Moscow ML's FFI and on
> dynamic linking.  MLton also has an FFI and supports dynamic linking,
> albeit with different syntax and capabilities from Moscow ML.  Have a
> look at
>
> 	http://mlton.org/ForeignFunctionInterface
>
> In particular, the following page shows how dl{close,open,sym}.
>
> 	http://mlton.org/CallingFromSMLToCFunctionPointer
>
> If those don't provide enough help to complete the port, please let us
> know.  Also, as we are actively trying to grow our list of available
> libraries, please let us know once the port is done by adding it to
>
> 	http://mlton.org/Libraries

Ok, thank you. For now this information will be enough... =)
By the way, what about SWIG (http://www.swig.org/) support? This will 
add lot's of software! OCaml support it...

Regards,
/Alexandre.