Weekly Perl 6 mailing list summary for August 20-26, 2006

  This week on the Perl 6 mailing lists

     "My school's punch card machines were in the same room as the TRS-80
     Model I ("THE COMPUTER ROOM"). These kids today with their hula hoops
     and fax machines and intarwebs..."

     -- Chip Salzenberg, arguing in *favor* of lines in excess of
     80-characters.


  perl6-language

   multi-line comments, C macros, & Pod abuse <http://xrl.us/qyci>

     Last week's summary covered this thread, which discussed easily
     commenting out a large chunk of code.

     This week the discussion continued slightly in to the realm of
     meta-programming and programming environments, but not much meat was
     added.

   clarify: does "Dog is Mammal" load Mammal for you? <http://xrl.us/q5ge>

     Mark Stosberg asked for clarification on S12 on whether `class Dog is
     Mammal` requires Mammal to be loaded in advance. The current version
     of Pugs needs an explicit `use Mammal`.

     Darren Duncan believed an implicit `use Mammal` should only occur
     conditionally, if a Mammal had been declared, but was concerned about
     potential bugs. Jonathan Scott Duff had the impression that preloading
     would not be required, and wondered if `class Dog is Mammal-4.5` would
     be valid. Trey Harris referenced S11 to claim that Jonathan's
     questionable syntax is valid. Andrew Suffield also tackled the
     question of versioned libraries.

   Heredoc issue in pugs. <http://xrl.us/q5gg>

     Yiyi Hu wanted to know the correct syntax for heredocs, as S02 and
     Pugs seem to be at odds. Larry Wall clarified that both are allowed.

     Luke Palmer expressed concern about the false duality of `:to` and
     `:from`. Larry noted that is why `:from` doesn't actually exist.

   Pair of lists => list of pairs? <http://xrl.us/rav7>

     Mark J. Reed asked how one would idiomatically write `my %h; @h{@keys}
     = @h{@values}` in Perl 6. Gaal Yahas suggested using ¥, the `zip`
     operator: `my %h = @keys ¥ @values`. Larry Wall suggested using a
     hyper pair: `my %h = @keys »=>« @values`.

   clarifying the spec for 'ref' <http://xrl.us/rav8>

     Mark Stosberg wanted Perl 6 to retain the Perl 5 responses to `ref` or
     justify the change in the documentation. Larry Wall explained that
     `ref` will not exist in Perl 6; instead, it will be something like
     `.what`, which will return the type itself, rather than a string.

     The thread then moved on to subclassing, after Luke Palmer suggested
     that `Array` would be a subtype of `Array::Const`, after Larry had
     stated the reverse. This led to a lengthy discussion on the subject.

   My first functional perl6 program <http://xrl.us/rav9>

     Mark J. Reed posted a simple program he wrote in Perl 6 for
     educational purposes, asking for critique.

     This lead to a discussion on the semantics of hyperoperators in
     relation to finite/infinite sequences.

  perl6-internals

   [perl #40162] [PATCH] parrot/trunk/docs/art/pp001-intro.pod - spelling
   <http://xrl.us/qvmp>

     Last week, in ticket [perl #40162] <http://xrl.us/qvmq>, Amir E .
     Aharoni sent a patch to correct some spelling errors.

     It was applied as r14297.

   [REPATCH] Parrot::Embed Take Two <http://xrl.us/qyb8>

     Previously, chromatic submitted a patch for the build file to try to
     resolve pkg_config issues with various platforms. He had some
     questions about installing from outside the Parrot tree on Windows.
     Leopold Toetsch offered a suggestion.

     This week, François Perrard explained how to solve the Windows issue.

   [perl #40204] line numbers of runtime errors are one too low
   <http://xrl.us/q5gh>

     Chip Salzenberg created ticket [perl #40204] <http://xrl.us/rawa>
     because runtime errors are off by one line. Leopold Toetsch thought
     this was the same error reported in [perl #38594]
     <http://xrl.us/rawb>, but Will Coleda disagreed. There was some
     discussion on when new tickets should be created.

   SKIPs Are Now a Code Smell <http://xrl.us/q5gj>

     chromatic made two commits to unskip some valid tests. He was
     concerned about the large number of tests which are being skipped in
     Parrot. He suggested unskipping all tests which might pass, and use
     TODO or deletion depending upon the relevance of the test. This was
     added as a Cage Cleaner's task.

   [perl #40207] [PATCH] tools/dev/install_files.pl - replace tabs with
   spaces <http://xrl.us/raw6>

     Amir E . Aharoni created the ticket, [perl #40207]
     <http://xrl.us/rawc>, in which he supplied a patch that corrects the
     indentation of `tools/dev/install_files.pl`.

   [perl #40209] [TODO] convert t/compilers/pge/p6regex/01-regex.t to PIR
   <http://xrl.us/q5gq>

     Will Coleda wanted the tests in PIR instead of Perl to make `make
     test` faster and to give a template for other test conversions. See
     ticket [perl #40209] <http://xrl.us/rawd>.

   [perl #40210] [TODO] Provide a way for PGE's dump to go to string
   <http://xrl.us/q5gr>

     In ticket [perl #40210] <http://xrl.us/rawe>, Will Coleda noted that
     it would be useful to get a string when dumping, for testing. Patrick
     R. Michaud created the `dump_str` method in r14306.

   End the Hollerith Tyranny? (linelength.t) <http://xrl.us/q5gs>

     Chip Salzenberg asked if anyone has any reservations from making the
     parrot's source code repository follow a wrapping convention of over
     80 columns. Some people said they were old enough to have used
     terminals that couldn't physically support that, at which point Chip
     showed them he was actually older.

     It seems that the general consensus is to try to aim for 80 columns,
     but that a hard limit of 100 will be set for when that doesn't work
     well.

   [svn:parrot-pdd] r14308 - in trunk: . cage docs docs/art docs/dev
   docs/imcc docs/pdds docs/pdds/clip docs/stm languages languages/tcl/docs
   lib/Pod/Simple t/distro <http://xrl.us/q5gt>

     Joshua Hoblitt replied to a commit with a reminder that there is a
     utility for formatting Parrot's Pod <http://xrl.us/rawf>.

   #ParrotSketch Meeting 22AUG06 <http://xrl.us/q5gu>

     Will Coleda posted the URL of the 22 August #ParrotSketch log
     <http://xrl.us/rawg>.

   [perl #40217] Parrot_autoload_class() knows about Python and Tcl
   <http://xrl.us/q5gv>

     Chip Salzenberg wanted hardcoded language names in Parrot removed.
     This came up in ticket [perl #40217] <http://xrl.us/rawh>.

   LLVM and HLVM <http://xrl.us/q5gw>

     John Siracusa wondered if anyone had looked at LLVM recently and
     wondered if Parrot might be able to target LLVM bytecode and let it do
     further optimization for OS X. Peter Baylies responded that he'd
     looked at it, and was currently waiting for an x86-64 build. Peter was
     not sure there were benefits in targeting LLVM. Aaron Sherman added
     that the extra layers would probably not make up for any optimization
     gains.

   [perl #40218] [BUG] - get_*_global opcodes throw exceptions
   <http://xrl.us/q5gx>

     In ticket [perl #40218] <http://xrl.us/rawi>, Matt Diephouse noted
     that the documentation of get_*_hll says "If the global doesn't exist,
     $1 is set to null" but currently it throws an exception.

   [perl #40219] [TODO] - Steal Perl5's sprintf tests <http://xrl.us/q5gy>

     Matt Diephouse created ticket [perl #40219] <http://xrl.us/rawj>. He
     suggested using Perl 5's sprintf tests instead of writing new ones.

   [perl #40225] Making Makefiles... <http://xrl.us/q5gz>

     Will Coleda created ticket [perl #40225] <http://xrl.us/rawk> to
     address the new features he'd like in `genfile()` when generating
     makefiles. Leopold Toetsch thought that instead of inventing custom
     make extensions, there should be a few needed gmake extensions. Will
     agreed with stealing gmake syntax. Joshua Hoblitt disagreed with the
     proposal. Will responded.

   Announcing the Perl 6 and Parrot wiki workspaces <http://xrl.us/rawm>

     Andy Lester announced the Perl 6 <http://rakudo.org/perl6> and Parrot
     <http://rakudo.org/parrot> wikis.

   [perl #40231] [PATCH] t/compilers/pge/06-grammar.t written in PIR
   <http://xrl.us/rawn>

     Nuno Carvalho rewrote `t/compilers/pge/06-grammar.t` in PIR and put it
     in ticket [perl #40231] <http://xrl.us/rawo>.

   Dumb Configure.pl question <http://xrl.us/rawp>

     Mark J. Reed was running in to problems with linking when building
     Parrot on OS X. Will Coleda listed some arguments that can be used in
     configuration to support linking.

   Find out in program code, if a PMC-property is set? <http://xrl.us/rawq>

     Gerd Pokorra had issues extracting a PMC property when that property
     has not been explicitly set, and wondered how one could go about
     introspecting the PMC to determine whether or not a property is set.
     Bob Rogers advised checking `PMC_IS_NULL`.

   String.to_int() vs. opcode <http://xrl.us/raws>

     Chip Salzenberg posted in response to Leopold Toetsch's addition of
     `to_int()` to String. Chip suggested making it a common subroutine in
     the C source. Will Coleda disagreed on the grounds that it is a
     method, not an opcode, and that not everything needs to be a PMC.
     Jerry Gay agreed with Chip. Chip also replied.

   [perl #40210] [TODO] Provide a way for PGE's dump to go to string
   <http://xrl.us/rawt>

     Will Coleda created a ticket asking for PGE's `dump` to be able to go
     to a string, and not just output, for testing purposes. Patrick R.
     Michaud added a `dump_str` method in r14306, and then closed the
     ticket.

  perl6-users

   junctions and autothreading <http://xrl.us/q5g2>

     Amir E. Aharoni wanted to know what the status of 'autothreading' was,
     after seeing some tantalizing references to it. Conrad Schneiker
     didn't know, but suggested that looking at the #perl IRC log search
     <http://xrl.us/rawu> as another document resource.

   a practical question <http://xrl.us/q5g3>

     Richard Nabil Hainsworth wanted to know how he could write an
     application in Perl 6 which works with GUI toolkits such as WxWidgets.
     Conrad Schneiker had a similar interest, although he focused on XPCOM,
     XUL and other Mozilla GUI technologies. Steffen Schwigon suggested
     some experimentation with using Perl 5 libraries, and requested that
     Richard document his experiences.

   Latest $1,000 Wiki for Perl 6 proposal/offer. <http://xrl.us/q5g4>

     Conrad Schneiker brought up the long-running subject of the Perl 6
     wiki bounty (refer to summaries for July and June for more information
     on the history of this topic). He hoped that TPF could determine the
     conditions of the contest. Andy Lester replied that he was in the
     process of setting up a wiki for Perl documentation. Conrad asked a
     few questions about Andy's plans.

     Meanwhile, Paul Fenwick asked how PerlNet could improve to meet the
     needs of the Perl community. Conrad and Amir E. Aharoni responded.

   Same-named arguments <http://xrl.us/q5g5>

     Michael Snoyman wanted to know what would happen if there was a
     parameter list which included variables of a different type but the
     same name. He included the results he got when trying it. Juerd said
     he felt it should cause a compile time failure or a warning.

     Michael reposted the message to the language mailing list: Same-named
     arguments <http://xrl.us/q5g5>.

   IO::Socket, or any IO <http://xrl.us/rawv>

     Michael Snoyman wanted to know what the Pugs version of IO::Socket is.

  perl6-compiler

   Integrating the Pugs test suite into the Synopses <http://xrl.us/q5g7>

     Agent Zhang announced that the test snippets in the Pugs test suite
     have now been included in the Synopses, thanks to smartlinks
     <http://svn.openfoundry.org/pugs/t/README>.

   Ponie has been put out to pasture <http://xrl.us/raww>

     Jesse Vincent announced the end of the Ponie project. Making Perl 5
     code run seamlessly alongside Perl 6 in Parrot is still a goal, but it
     is being addressed in other ways.

   pugs: rw block parameters <http://xrl.us/rawx>

     Mark J. Reed wanted to know if rw parameters for blocks had been
     implemented. Larry Wall agreed that it was not currently working.
     Audrey Tang made clarification in r12675. Tests (37 and 38) were added
     to `for.t` for the situation Mark described, as r12968.

   Pugs bugs <http://xrl.us/rawy>

     Mark J. Reed wondered if Pugs bugs were stored somewhere, so that he
     could avoid mentioning known bugs. He included some questions. Larry
     Wall replied that in Pugs, a bug is represented by a failing test. He
     also answered questions.

  Acknowlegements

     Yuval Kogman once again contributed summaries for some of the threads.

     This summary was prepared using Mail::Summary::Tools
     <http://xrl.us/qvno>, now available on CPAN.

     If you appreciate Perl, consider [contributing to the Perl
     Foundation](http://donate.perlfoundation.org) to help support the
     development of Perl.

     Thank you to everyone who has pointed out mistakes and offered
     suggestions for improving this series. Comments on this summary can be
     sent to Ann Barcomb, <[email protected]>.

  Distribution

     This summary can be found in the following places:

     * use.perl.org <http://use.perl.org/>
     * The pugs blog <http://pugs.blogs.com/>
     * The perl6-announce mailing list <http://xrl.us/qycj>
     * ONLamp <http://www.oreillynet.com/>

  See Also

     * Perl Foundation activities <http://blog.perlfoundation.org>
     * Perl 6 Development <http://dev.perl.org/perl6>
     * Planet Perl Six <http://planetsix.perl.org/perl6>