Re: guile history: your input needed!

[Neil Jerram]

2008/11/22 Keith Wright <address@hidden>:
>
> It can't hurt, can it?

That is rarely a good enough argument.

> What _would_ help us?

A better statement of Guile's current purpose.

> Whatever happened to tcl?

Are you joking here?  If not, see gitk.

> Those who do not remember history are doomed to repeat it again
> and again repeatedly.

Good point.  I believe that I personally remember the history (up to a
point), but I see now that that's not good enough.

> Of course we want somebody who can actually write the truth;
> just rumor spreading is of little use.
>
> A record of what the goals were and why they changed can
> be helpful both for getting new people interested, and reminding
> veterans what they were fighting for.

Yes.  Actually I would be interested to see past goal statements too.

> I am particularly interested in a short description of the
> gh_ interface.  At one time it was billed as the new
> way to call C, which would be somewhat portable.  Then
> it was deprecated and removed.  What happened?

See 
http://www.gnu.org/software/guile/manual/html_node/GH-deprecation.html#GH-deprecation.
 If you have specific questions, we can try to improve that text.

> Several other directions seem to have been pursued for
> a while and then abandonded.  If nobody remembers why,
> then maybe someone will try the same thing again.
> Maybe that's a good thing, because a worthy goal
> remains to be accomplished.  It won't be if it's
> forgotten.  Maybe it's a bad thing because there were
> good reasons for the change, which should not be
> forgotten, either.

Yes, I agree that this would be useful.

> Do you hate change logs?

No.  And I don't think they're analogous.

Regards,
     Neil