[Pyrex] pyrex for parrots?

[Greg Ewing]

Michal Wallace wrote:

> Why do you say dangerous? I really know nothing about
> garbage collection, so I could be completely wrong,
> but what's the worst that could happen? A memory leak?

Yes, potentially a very large one if you're making
extensive use of Python objects.

> (Parrot has it's own garbage collection scheme)

Possibly the Parrot GC could be made to work on the
Python objects too. Without knowing anything about
Parrot's GC, I can't say how difficult it would be.
Again, you'd need detailed knowledge of both systems
to pull it off.

> It seems like pyrex could benefit from the same kind
> of refactoring... Then you could have separate backends to create 
> modules for for cpython, jython (using JNI), pirate, IronPython, and 
> whatever else crops up. Have you thought about doing something like that?

I hadn't. It's an interesting idea, although changing
the target language is likely to have implications for
the Pyrex language itself, not just the compiler --
currently it's heavily oriented towards C.

Pyrex could probably do with some refactoring anyway,
since it's currently one big entwined lump. I don't have
the stamina to do it myself just at the moment, but
you're welcome to have a go if you like.


>  the difference between visual c 
> and pyrex is like night and day. Thanks for making it! :)

Glad you're finding it useful!

-- 
Greg Ewing, Computer Science Dept, +--------------------------------------+
University of Canterbury,	   | A citizen of NewZealandCorp, a	  |
Christchurch, New Zealand	   | wholly-owned subsidiary of USA Inc.  |
greg.ewing at canterbury.ac.nz	   +--------------------------------------+