stackless python

[Donn Cave]

Quoth Christian Tismer <tismer at tismer.com>:
...
| Continuations can do even more, they are able to create new
| control structures for your language. And exactly that it the point
| which makes them insuitable for Python: They are too powerful.
| Python has its own control structures, and we don't need a construct
| with the power to build some. This is oversized, and very oversized
| construct turns out to be a drawback at some future.
| What Python needs is a secure mechanism to switch frame changes
| at certain times. This is not continuations, but microthreads with
| explicit or implicit switching.
|
| I will implement this for Python 2.2, probably with some help
| of volunteers.

Could Gordon McMillan's "asyncore turned right-side out" select
dispatcher have been written with the microthread facility you
have in mind?

I am sure there's some way to present that capability in terms of
a pre-defined control structure, instead of raw continuations, but
it's a pity if it has to be given up because it's too powerful.

	Donn Cave, donn at drizzle.com