elisp -> Python (was Re: [OT] Emacs, Eclipse, Leo (was Re: IDE

[Ville Vainio]

>>>>> "Francois" == François Pinard <pinard at iro.umontreal.ca> writes:

    Francois> [Steve Menard]

    >> Here's an idea : how hard would it be to replace emacs's ELISP
    >> interpreter with Python, and translate the "main" ELISP modules to
    >> python?

    Francois> It would be a long and difficult task, in my opinion.
    Francois> One may also consider writing an Emacs Lisp interpreter
    Francois> in Python for recycling bulks of interesting Emacs Lisp
    Francois> modules or packages without translating them, but this
    Francois> is also fairly daunting, pondering how to do this
    Francois> properly.

How about just reusing the elisp interpreter in its C form, wrapping
it as a python library and tweaking it enough to make it store all
objects in the python object space? GC would need to be replaced with
INCRED/DECREF, but other than that, shouldn't the implementation of a
Lisp interpteret be almost trivial?

    Francois> Just dream and suppose it was doable to translate things
    Francois> like Gnus (or Calc) from Emacs Lisp to Python.  It would
    Francois> not make them simpler to learn nor to configure.  The
    Francois> heaviness lies in the problem, not in the language, so a
    Francois> change of language would not eradicate the heaviness.

Of course, that's why we would reuse those. New stuff (and hooks /
customization) could be implemented in Python. I imagine *many* more
people would be interested in improving, extending and maintaining
emacs if it was not in elisp; it's just not what kids want to use
anymore. The current slow pace of emacs development kinda makes it
obvious. Even the Common Lisp fans seem to dislike elisp.

    Francois> An unexpected advantage, and I discovered this only
    Francois> later, appeared when I switched from Emacs to Vim: all
    Francois> that Python code could be recycled into Vim with a
    Francois> moderate effort.  It could have been worse, for example,

You switched from emacs to vim? That borders on blasphemy ;-).

Seriously, is Vim as customizable/programmable in python as emacs is
in elisp? If that is the case, I'm switching too...

-- 
Ville Vainio   http://tinyurl.com/2prnb