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List:       lua-l
Subject:    Re: What is an extension language (was Re: need example code)
From:       Bennett Todd <bet () newritz ! mordor ! net>
Date:       1999-01-25 15:00:51
Message-ID: 19990125150051.C10550 () mordor ! net
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1999-01-23-00:57:22 Jay Glascoe:
> I just gave up on Perl as an extension language because IMO the Perl/C API
> is too bizarre.

As an extension language --- a language to use for the config file and for
user customization in an app written in some other language (e.g. C) my big
gripe with perl is that it's so _huge_. Likewise Python, and TCL. And even the
Scheme implementations I've seen, smaller than the above three sometimes, but
still 4-6 times bigger than Lua, or worse.

> have you taken a look at Guile yet?  It's still a few years away from
> being a serious contender in the extension/embedding language field,
> but I really like it.  The Guile/C API is very clean.

I peeked at it a couple of years back.

Back then it was based on a nice, quite popular (for a Scheme:-) interpreter,
SCM, which already wasn't tiny; I kinda assumed that by the time it was ready
to be called GNU Software the core interpreter would be well over a meg of
binary. Some times I think the Free Software Foundation has Microsoft envy.

Didn't even occur to me to give it a look; I was looking for something small,
I don't look to the FSF for that.

-Bennett

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